//------------------------------// // The Adventure begins // Story: Borderlands 2: Starlight DLC Pack // by the-pieman //------------------------------// “The answer, of course, is a big fat no. Though I like that ending, it’s just the beginning!” The large man settles back, a grin on his face as he settles into the story telling once more. ----- (/\) ----- “Vault key...” Anthony says, recalling the name as he’s ejected violently out of a wormhole that, moments prior, had just obliterated the six Loaders inside of a very tight, cramped delivery pod. The human stands up shakily, rubbing his head where he’d hit the side of the container, looking around at the rest of the six-foot-square area. Dash and Pinkie are also getting up next to him. “Owie-zowie... that wasn’t a very fun way to win a bet at all...” Pinkie says, pulling herself off the ground. “You said it, Pinks. Hey Anthony, you said you knew what that was? Well, where the hay are we?” she asks. The ‘room’, however, is all a uniform gray, with the one window being several feet above Anthony’s head. The central mechanism of the pod, being a series of clips to hold the Loaders, was missing, leaving just a series of safety belts for if some poor schmuck from engineering gets stuck in one before getting a ride to the surface. “Shit...” Anthony mutters. “Strap in, the ride’s not over yet!” “The ride? What ride?” Rainbow asks, getting ready to flap up towards the window, while Pinkie just looks confused as she begins buckling herself to the wall. Anthony, grumbling, grabs the blue pegasus and straps her in, as he’s not sure what they’re being launched at or from, and he doesn’t want a feathery bloodstain all over the pod if it’s a bad place to go. He’s barely strapped in himself when they all feel the G-forces of an immense acceleration, though it’s nowhere near as bad as it should be, judging by the way the lights flicker past the window. Outside that window, unbeknownst to any of the three inside, is a massive space station, shaped like a capital-H, and it just fired twenty-five pods of Loaders... and one pod with brand-new stowaways on it. Four of the pods explode in the upper atmosphere, a few skim across it to go to other locations, and three smash down into the middle of the Pandoran badlands, the sides slamming open to reveal their dangerous contents. And two ponies and a human, of course. The first thing any of those three hear is gunfire and screaming, and both Dash and Pinkie look both shocked and surprised and more than a little dazed, the both of them stuck sideways to their spots in the container thanks to some impressive shaking on the way down. Grabbing his head to steady himself from the sudden stop, Anthony swears again... “Ugh... please let it be over.” A robotic voice calls forth from nearby, and the sound of whirring gears and clanging pistons approach the pod. Robots? Anthony was confused. Wait a minute.... A realization struck him. That was a Vault Key. And robots... plus Vault Key, equals Hyperion.... “Loaders! Aim for the joints!” He yells as he ducks for cover. “Pandora. We’re on motherfucking Pandora!” The Loader, identifying his advice as definitely hostile, speeds up and marches around the scant cover the corner of the pod provides, and sights him with its one robotic eye, leveling what looks like a pistol at his face. His life flashes before his eyes out of fear, an instinctive review of everything leading up to the moment to see if there’s anything he can do to escape this fate, but his back’s against the wall, his friends are strapped to the same wall, and there’s nothing he can- K-BLAM The sound of a shotgun going off and the subsequent squeal of a downed robot assaults Anthony’s eardrums, and makes Pinkie and Dash cover their ears, as the Loader ends up face planted, one leg missing and the other mangled as it begins to try crawling away, its gun laying on the ground by Anthony’s feet. The Loader chants as its programming recognizes the attack as one meant to incapacitate, not kill, meaning a Vault Hunter was close. Anthony, letting his gaming instincts take over, grabs the pistol and, thankful for its easy grip, shoots a few rounds.... missing every one of them but after enough spraying, lands a bullet in the robot’s eye. “You’re kidding me! Who stole my kill?” An angry, vaguely mexican-sounding voice calls, and the tromp of boots approaches the pod. “You a raider, or what? Come out, afore I shoot your cover fulla holes!” Anthony walks out into clear view, hands up and dropping the pistol. “Not raiders. We got stuck in-” “Ey, why you throwing a gun around; is disrespectful!” the angry, dwarf-like Truxican yells, and steps into view. He looks them over. “You don’ look like Hyperion. What are you doing here, and why aren’t you running around where I can shoot you?” “We’re not Hyperion we’re...” Anthony’s mind rushes to think of what he could say. “We’re Vault Hunters. We got to the Hyperion moonbase but they launched us back out with the Loaders.” Salvador (and it really couldn’t be anyone else) looks at him incredulously. “Huh. So... you’re a vault hunter too? Does that mean I can sh-” “God, damnit, Salvador! That hurt! You can’t go shooting your allies in the back, or next time, so help me, I’m gonna shoot you in the face!” A caucasian man in his late twenties, early thirties climbs over a piece of wrecked car, looking down at the Truxican angrily, before looking up at Anthony. “Who’re you, shrimpy?” “Anthony! I, er... we’re Vault Hunters... these two and me.” Anthony says, getting down slowly to pick up the Hyperion pistol. He gets Pinkie and Dash free from the wall. “Can ya walk?” As Rainbow Dash and Pinkie get unsteadily to their hooves, Salvador gets his first look at them. “¿Qué coño estoy mirando un caramelo sin ponis?” he asks wonderingly. Anthony, for his part, has no idea what Salvador said but got ‘pony’ out of it. “Yeah, ponies. We were warped to the Hyperion moonbase and got launched here with the Loaders.” Anthony repeats. “Uh huh... Well... uh... huh.” the man, Axton if you go by the rank tabs stuck to his face, looks more baffled than anything. “Well, I guess I might as well give you a better ‘welcome to pandora’ than we got. We got dynamite. What the hell’re your friends?” he asks, as he checks for a couple of weak guns he was gonna sell, before just tossing them over. “And keep in mind, I’ll blow your heads off if any of you shoot me in the back. Anthony turns back to Axton after grabbing a Tediore pistol, easily recognized by the plastic casing and rough, poorly-manufactured edges. “Wouldn’t dream of it, sir.” “Right... listen, we’re heading to our meet-up point. Me, Salvador, and our buddies are gonna compare notes and make sure we don’t miss anything important. Maybe one of them’ll have the attention span and fucks to give to figure you three out. You know how to drive?” he asks, turning to stomp away, as the two ponies look with utter bafflement to Anthony. “Just let me do the talking.” He says. “I’ll explain everything later. As for driving. I’ve only played video ga- er, ECHO sims.” “Yeah, that won’t cut it ‘round here. You better hope you can learn fast, though, or you’re gonna end up a grease-stain, since neither Salvador nor Krieg like to share the gunner’s seats.” Axton says, tromping over to a forest-camo vehicle, one clearly made for quick travel. “Heh, you guys can hold onto the top, we’ll only take a minute or two... just hold on when we get to the bumps.” “Hold on?” Rainbow Dash says, hovering into the air. “I’ll race ya!” “No! Not now Dash.” Anthony says, teeth gritted. A moment later, Dash cries out as her wings seem to give out. “Aw, what gives? Why can’t I fly?” she complains, rubbing her rear where she landed. “Madre de Dios, mis hermanas would love you.” Salvador comments in awe as the blue pony talks, thinking about his family. “Eheheheh, don’t mind them, we’ll just hold on as best we can.” Anthony says, rubbing the back of his head. “Aw, c’mon!” Dash yells in a huff, before resigning herself to being a hang-on, and gripping it. Pinkie, meanwhile, seems to have vanished, until Salvador gets into the gunner’s seat and Pinkie pops up, a grin on her face. “It’s like a super-party-cannon, but there’s no cake! It’s almost as awesome, and I wish I had a bakery so I could add some cookies to it!” Salvador looks mildly terrified, and given that there’s barely enough room for his legs under there, it’s understandable why he’d be worried about the pony being able to fit in under him. “Pinkie, he said not to use the gunner seat!” Anthony says, trying to find decent purchase on the two-man vehicle. “Silly, I’m not using the gunner’s seat, I’m using Sal’s lap!” she says, beaming at her logical prowess. Salvador gives a shrug, and wraps his arms around her, as she smells like candy and food, two things he likes. “Wow, you smell like sweat and anger!” she comments as the car takes off. “Pinkie Pie, sniffing is rude!” Anthony decides to take a different approach to reprimanding the pony, to hopefully get her to calm down. “You don’t wanna make him angry.” “But I didn’t need to sniff!” she says, and Salvador laughs, evidently finding it funny he has BO. “Can’t believe I can’t fly...” Rainbow mourns. “So are we going or what?” “Oh, not fast enough for you?” Axton calls, and Anthony gets a pang of fear in his heart as he hears the tone in the man’s voice. Anthony has barely enough time to get a genuinely good grip on the roll cage of the car before Axton smashes flat the boost pedal, and the vehicle practically flies across the stones, snow, and dead scrub of the Pandoran winter’s wastes. Rainbow Dash lets loose a giddy laugh, Salvador and Axton whooping and hollering happily, as Anthony just tries not to fall off with every bounce, jolt, and shuddering tremble of the car as it hits literally anything on the road at all. It’s not long, but eventually they come to a near-crashing halt at what looks kinda like a gas station, a few vending machines nearby a sort of garage, three other vehicles parked there. “Never... Again...” Anthony pants as Rainbow comments on what a rush it was. Pinkie pops out of the car and rolls around in the snow, addressing Anthony as she plays. “So, you said you’d explain later and... it’s later!” Anthony sighs and sits down. He opens his mouth and- “Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!” With a shriek like an angry, and very strangled Rakk, a third Vault Hunter leaps over a car and lunges at Rainbow Dash, literally tackling the pegasus off the top of Axton and Salvador’s car. “Omigod Omigod OmigodOmigodOmigod, you’re ado~orable! Aghdifasble!” The mechromancer, with an arm that can punch through steel, has a death grip on Rainbow Dash, and is petting her with the other, the confused and very scared speedster not even able to struggle out of the hold. “H-help... me...” Anthony walks up to the... she can’t be more than, what, fifteen? Fourteen? She’s young but very intimidating with the robotic prosthetic. Anyways, Anthony walks up to the girl and pats her on the shoulder. “Uh... that blue thing is mine...” “I will pay you a zillion dollars for her, right now.” she says, looking up at him with a dead-serious expression. “You don’t even have a million dollars, Gaige.” Axton butts in, dragging a small sled covered in guns from behind a dead bush and brushing the snow off them. He takes it closer to the vending machines. “I’ll kill Axton and give you all his guns for her.” Gaige amends. “I...” Anthony looks at the huge supply of guns and to an avid gamer like he was, it was a hard bargain. Or it would be except for one thing. “Sorry, she’s my friend. I’m not gonna sell her.” Gaige tries one more time, simply giving her best pouty eyes and petting the slowly-strangling Rainbow Dash. The effect would be way better if she wasn’t decked out like a goth punk cyborg with serious anger issues, which she is. Anthony is about to say something but eyes one of the guns in the pile. He hesitates but takes a deep breath. It just wouldn’t be right to sell Rainbow. But... “But you can borrow her if I can get that sweet Assault Rifle.” “Traitor!” Rainbow yells, mostly strangled. “Hey, I said borrow not keep. Besides, look at this thing! It’s got a Vladof Barrel and a Hyperion scope! This thing will be firing bullets like hell and get better the farther away the target is!” “Yeah, but it’s pretty shitty. I mean, if you want it, keep it.” Axton says, and literally kicks the gun at Anthony, who realizes that it’s basically made out of plywood and tin, and may actually be lighter than its magazines. “Sorry, we don’t have ECHOs, can’t really see the ‘stats’ from a distance.” Anthony says. “If it was better quality though it might be a fair trade.” Axton shrugs and goes back to loading the items from his sled into the vending machine, digistructing them down. Salvador is doing the same, but simply attempting to jam the guns into the vending machines by force, something that is, apparently, working. Gaige looks at Anthony and Dash curiously. “So, wait... you guys have no gear at all? Damn... wait, I think I can get you guys some, berb!” “Uh... sure.” Pinkie, now making a snowpony, asks what’s going on again. “You said you’d tell us.” “Yeah. And who’s the weird girl?” RD asks, shuddering. Anthony sits down again. “Well that thing that sent us here was a Vault Key...” Anthony gets some interested double-takes from the other Vault Hunters. “Hold up, you have a Vault key?” Axton asks, looking over from his gun-selling. “Where’d it go?” Anthony shrugs. “Dunno, a friend of mine touched it and I did too and it sent us here. Well, not here here, it sent us to Pandora’s resident Jackhole’s space station.” Salvador chuckles at the name. “So that’s how you got onto the moonbase. Huh. So where’d you three come from? And how’d you train those two to talk?” Dash responds by puffing up her cheeks angrily, a sure sign she’s about to begin yelling. Anthony, by this point, is tired and figures Dash has had a rough day so he decides to just brace for the impact of the outburst. “He didn’t train us! I’ve always been able to talk! And I used to be the fastest flier ever until I showed up in this stupid place!” “Pandora.” Anthony corrects her. “We’re on the gods-forsaken planet of Pandora. The armpit of the galaxy and by far the best place to go if you want a psycho to rip your head off or get shot in the face by robots led by the world’s biggest douchebag.” “But at least it ain’t Promethea!” Gaige says, sliding back down to where the ponies are. “Here, I made three, and these two can clip into your hair. Oooh, can I brush your hair, it’s sooo pretty!” she shouts, running her hand through Rainbow Dash’s mane. Said pony just waves her hoof angrily, trying to swat the young teen’s hands away. “No! And if you try touching my hooves and giving me a hooficure I’ll rearrange your face!” “Rainbow Dash, don’t antagonize the chick with a robot arm.” Anthony says, sighing again. Gaige, however, seems to like it. “Aw man, you got sass and you’ve got a pretty mane! I want you to know, pony, that Imma braid it one day... one day.” she says the last part grinning maniacally, quietly handing the ECHO to Anthony and Pinkie, and thoroughly creeping out Rainbow Dash. Anthony helps Pinkie with the ECHO and puts his on. A health bar, ammo count for his current weapon, number of grenades and minimap appears in his vision. He quickly explains the HUD to Pinkie and Dash who get used to it after a while. “So yeah, Pandora’s a shithole... but also the location of a vault. Vaults are... uh... well, it depends really but usually it’s a huge cache of loot.” “Vaults are dangerous. And one hell of a challenge. It is why I’m here.” Comes a voice from thin air before a flash of light reveals a tall, lanky, faceless figure, a red ‘zero’ being projected from the face-concealing helmet. “Who are these creatures? They are curious indeed. Are they any threat?” “No!” Anthony yells as the figure points a gun at Pinkie Pie. “They’re my friends! Don’t kill them!” “Full of loot? You mean, like candy? *gasp* what if this vault is a giant pinata!?” Pinkie says, not really comprehending what the assassin was doing. Anthony sighs. “No, more like a ton of money, eridium and guns.” Rainbow slips out of Gaige’s grasp with a bit of difficulty. “You sure talk about guns a lot.” “Welcome to Pandora, where a gun can be your best friend and nobody would think you’re weird.” Anthony says. “Well, maybe a little weird, but not that weird.” Anthony looks over to the sled of guns again and, with his ECHO, picks out a green light among all the whites. “Why’s that one green?” Pinkie asks.   “It’s to show rarity and value for it’s level.” Anthony says. “Rarity scale goes White, Green, Blue, Purple, Orange, Pearlescent.” The Green turns out to be a fairly decent pistol but a higher level than Anthony was allowed to carry unfortunately. “Yeah, that sled’s all vendor trash.” Axton says, sighing. “Already tallied it up. Worth more than a few thousand bucks, but not all that much more.” “You plan on living? You three won’t last long out here. What skills do you have?” Zer0 says in his typical Haiku-laced speech. “I’m the fastest flier in Ponyville!” Rainbow says first but is muffled by Gaige. “You live in a place called ponyville!? Omigosh that’s awesome!” Pinkie in typical form seems to not have heard Zer0 and instead starts an entirely new conversation. “My name is Pinkie! I live in Ponyville too. D’you wanna be friends?” Zer0 pauses, staring at Pinkie Pie, blank of any emotion behind his faceplate. The assassin makes no moves or sounds at all but after a bit the red zero projected from his helmet blinks and shows a simplistic happy face before switching back off immediately. “Back to my question.” Anthony thinks for a second. “I’m incredibly genre savvy...” The Vault Hunters look at Anthony in silence before laughing uproariously, save for Zer0. “That’s not what he meant. He means what have you got?” Axton clarifies. Anthony tries to spark up but is racked with a wave of nausea and only summons a flicker of light. Holding his stomach, Anthony leans against the sled of weapons. “Ugh... used to be better than that... Vault Key must have... done something to my powers. Urp.” “You mean you can’t go all glowy anymore?” Pinkie asks worriedly. Axton quirks an eyebrow. “Glowy? You some kinda Siren, kid?” “Urgh... uh, kinda, not really.” “Huh, you must need to kill a few more things first. Anyways, you got guns, and you’re lookin’ for a Vault, and it sounds like you know that puto Jack?” Salvador says. “Sounds like you got a wa~ay better welcome party than us.” “If you count us almost being creamed by riding one of the Loader moonshots ‘better’ then yeah.” “Holy cow! Who’re the new users?” a slightly annoying but ultimately cheerful voice calls over the ECHO network. “I mean, there’s gotta be a glitch in here, ‘cuz it says there’s... uh... ponies! Rainbow Pony and Pink Pony! I think, this text is small and I don’t have my monocle installed.” “Oh god...” Anthony mutters. “Of course, Claptrap...” “Wait, you know me?” The robot sounds utterly ecstatic, above and beyond his normal voice, and every Vault hunter in the know is looking like they were hoping he wouldn’t speak up. “Wow, I’m famous! OR infamous, both’re grrreat!” Anthony rubs his temple in annoyance. “Yes I know your model line. Weren’t you discontinued?” “Only mostly! All my brothers and sisters were crushed and destroyed before my very eye, and now it’s an extremely touchy and emotional subject for me! So, who’re you, buddy?” “Anthony, and didn’t your model come with a volume control?” “Nope! At least I don’t think so, but I’ve never read my own manual. I mean, I’m not a pervert.” “Get used to that voice, guys.” Anthony says, sighing heavily. “I kinda like it!” Pinkie says, beaming off in a random direction. “Hiya, I’m Pinkie Pie, and I have no idea where you are, but I wanna be your friend!” “Wow! Someone wanting to be my friend before I’ve even offered friendship? Robot heaven must be a real place! I’m in Sanctuary, and you’ve gotta check out my pad, Pinkie Pop!” Pinkie just giggles. “Sure!” Anthony says with mock enthusiasm. “Let’s go meet the tiny one-eyed robot so he can talk our ears off in person rather than hearing him over the darned radio.” “Oh, I’d never do that, and if I did, I’d offer superglue!” Clappy says, with entirely not mock-enthusiasm. Dash just shakes her head. “So how the hay is he talking to us, anyways?” she rubs her ear, evidently trying to remove the annoying voice before it burrows any deeper. “Wow, you’re from some kinda low-tech world, aren’t you?” a bored female voice says, as Maya joins the group. Her Siren’s markings glow with a soft blue light, even in the light, evidence of her readiness to use her power at a moment’s notice. Anthony explains the ECHOnet as simply as he can to the ponies. “Think like magic but it’s electronic and... not magic.” Pinkie salutes and smiles. “Got it! That helps not at all!” Anthony sighs and turns to the other Hunters. “Where they come from, they haven’t even invented the microwave oven yet.” “Geeeeeeeeeez, that’s like, the dark ages or something!” Gaige exclaims. “Bet I could show up there with Deathtrap and be all ‘I’m a wizard from the far future, rawr!’.” Anthony grins. “You punch the big white one in the face and I’ll give you a billion dollars.” “No way! I’d brush her mane and ride her all over the place, and install death lasers in her eyes!” “I doubt she’d like that...” Rainbow Dash says. “Princess Celestia doesn’t like-” “She’s a PRINCESS!? AWW YUSSS. You gotta take me with you when you get back!” Gaige says, tugging at Anthony’s arm, almost knocking him over. “Eh, sure, why not? Might be good for a few laughs.” Anthony relents before Gaige can tear his arm off. “But first we gotta get home. And since a Vault Key brought us here I’m willing to bet we’re gonna need another key and a shitload of Eridium to power that sucker before we can get back.” The vault hunters all nod. “No kidding, though it might not be a Vault Key, but something similar.” Maya says. “I mean, don’t rule it out or anything.” Anthony is about to agree, when a sound interrupts him. The roar of an engine and a lot of screaming to be specific. Turning to see where the sound is coming from, the group sees a flaming car flying across the snowy wasteland, a large man, also on fire, ‘driving’ as he knocks others off, and everyone on the car is screaming, while the tagalongs and stowaways are being flung off the car. It crashes into a rocky cliff face, throwing the entire lot to the ground, the large one popping up immediately, still on fire, and shouting, “BRAKES DON’T WORK WITH BRICKS!!!!” Anthony just stares at the spectacle. “Is that... was that Psycho driving a car... that’s on fire, while beating the crap out of other psychos?” Gaige pumps her fists, then pulls out a Tediore Shotgun, grinning widely. “Go Krieg! Let’s get some shooting done!” she shouts, and cackles madly, the other Vault Hunters getting equally deranged grins as they see the advancing wave of bandits and pulling out their own weapons. Zer0 has a sniper rifle of Maliwan make, Salvador has a Torgue Quad-Barrel Shotgun, Maya a Tediore SMG, Axton has pulled out a Dahl Assault Rifle, and all of them look so pleased. “Wait, are these guys here for a party?” Pinkie asks, looking baffled. “Eeyup.” Anthony says. “But not your kind of party. The Pandoran kind of party.” Anthony takes the Hyperion pistol he’d acquired from the Loader and prepares for battle, before... “Ah shit, I don’t have a shield! I’m gonna get perforated! Run!” Rainbow Dash shakes her head. “No way, I’m not gonna run from-” she’s cut off by a stray bullet from the mob zipping past her cheek, drawing blood and making her cry out as she goes to her knees. “AUGH!” “Imagine that hitting you in the knee!” Anthony yells. “Now run before the firefight gets closer!” “You hit the rainbow pony! Kill ‘em all, Deathtrap!” Gaige yells, enraged at the shot hitting her favored pony. Within moments, right in front of Anthony, a seven-foot-tall hovering contraption made of scrap metal and recycled CL4P-TP units digistructs, its sole eye and armored head turned towards its mistress before turning towards the enemies that had made the fatal mistake of angering her. Next to Deathtrap, a turret pops up, digistructed out of a ‘grenade’, and the other Vault Hunters all scream and shout and begin to charge, the flaming, giant Psycho screaming obscenities and crashing into the frontlines of Bandits. Anthony points to the vault hunters. “Unless you can do something like that, we’re running!” Rainbow looks like she’s going to argue again until a Bandit unloads a Jakobs shotgun point-blank into Krieg’s chest, and it only makes him angrier. “Uh, gotcha,” she says with wide eyes, and grabs Pinkie, who’s staring intently at the fight as Anthony and Dash drag her to safety behind the larger vehicle parked in the ‘gas station’. Anthony looks around for a Zed machine, hoping to purchase a shield, but the only vending machines are for guns and ammo. “Damnit, Marcus is cornering the market out here.” “Who’s Marcus?” “Someone you’ll learn to love once you get a damn good deal on a Jakobs sniper rifle.” Anthony says. “And I was not paid to say that.” Rainbow Dash nods. “Of course not, that’d be ridiculous.” Pinkie looks back and forth, wondering about their choice of words, before looking over the fighting once again. Neither Anthony nor Dash hear her whisper to herself, “I think I understand this party now...” ----- (/\) ----- Five of the Vault Hunters come back, laughing and dragging more loot than before, Krieg having ‘fun’ stomping or dancing on the back of a still-living Psycho, who’s calling out nursery rhymes as he’s trampled to death. Anthony looks out at the field, practically all the snow stained reddish brown with blood and all sorts of insides that were now outside. Impressively, there isn’t a single dead body, each one having sat for only a few moments before digistructing away. “Gotta say one thing for Jack. He keeps the planet from stinking like a morgue.” Maya laugh and nods. “Yeah, no kidding! Oh, hey, you don’t have a shield, do ya?” she asks, “Or were you just practising sniping with that pea-shooter?” “No shields. Was gonna rush in there, but, uh... yeah. Expensive to die and I’m strapped for cash.” Maya nods. “Here, we’ve all got extras, here’s one I’ve had for a while. It’ll do ya for now.” she says, and tossed the young man a simple Tediore shield, nothing flashy or strong, but effective enough. Gaige quickly acts to give Rainbow Dash one of her own, and Pinkie gets one from Salvadore, who is showing a remarkable amount of compassion, given he’s a native of Pandora. And one with violent tendencies notable even among the crowds of Psychos and Bandits. Anthony takes the shield and clips it to his belt, and watches as a blue bar above his health slowly, very slowly, fills up. “What’s the recharge rate on this thing?” He brings up the ECHO’s stats on his current gear and gawks at the low number. “Yeah, that’s a low-level Tediore Turtle for ya.” Maya says. “Sorry, but it’s not often we can loot shields. The bandits don’t use ‘em that much.” “Yeah, but hey, glad to have one in general, at least until I can get myself in the New-U station network.” “Oh! Oh right! I forgot to tell you something!” Claptrap says, practically shouting over the ECHONet. “I can get you into that! Gimme a sec... And... Oh, no, now Elvis is gonna spawn from the- no, not the fifty-fifth president of Atlas... ah, here we go! Ant-Berry, Raindrops, and Purple Pie are all in the system now! Aren’t I a great friend!?” Anthony sighs then whispers to Maya, “We’ll find one and do it manually.” The Siren giggles and nods. “Yeah... we have an angel on our side for stuff like that.” she whispers back. “Like, literally, she calls herself Angel and everything.” Anthony stops, recalling Angel from the game and exactly who she is. “Uhhh... about Angel...” He looks at Maya then decides not to ‘spoil’ everything lest the space-time continuum not like him revealing secrets. “Do you know where she is?” “Oh, have you already met her?” Maya asks, looking a bit brighter. “We don’t know where she is, but she’s been a friend to us so far.” “Not... personally.” “Did the whole ‘Ghost on the Net’ thing, right? Yeah, we all got messages from her like that. I think she just likes Vault Hunters or something.” she bumps Anthony’s shoulder. “Hey, if you’re looking to get some good beginner’s loot and level up that clearance rating of yours, you’re gonna want to go raid the Bullymong colony south of here. They’re a pain, but they repopulate super-quick.” she suggests. “Yeah, now that we’ve got weapons and protection, I think we can handle ourselves for a bit. But hey, don’t be strangers.” Maya bids the three goodbye as they walk off, Pinkie asking why they didn’t stay together. “Well, see, I know things that... they shouldn’t know. Not yet. And it’s probably best that we split up anyway, they’re much higher level than us and if we stick together we’d just drag them down.” “So we gotta get tough so we can reach their level, right?” Rainbow asks. “Like one of those arcade games the foals play?” “Wait, how do you know something they shouldn’t know? And aren’t you friends? Is it a surprise party? ‘Cuz that’s the only kinda secret you should keep from your friends.” Pinkie says. Anthony nods at Rainbow. “Exactly like the games. And as for a surprise... it’s the biggest surprise ever. It’ll even have one of their friends... falling over.” “Why’s he gonna fall over?” Pinkie asks, going a bit quiet as her intuition gives her an inkling of the truth. Anthony wrings his hands. “He’s going to be really, extra-special surprised...” “Anthony... it’s not a nice surprise party, is it?” she asks, getting an odd, puzzled look from Rainbow Dash. “Yeah... it’s an ambush, a trap. And unless we can throw a wrench in Jack’s plans, people... good people, innocent people, are gonna die. But we can’t help those Vault Hunters. Not directly.” Pinkie nods, but RD just shakes her head. “Wait, they gave us stuff, for free, just to be nice, and we’re not going to help them? What the heck, Anthony?” “Rainbow, what does your ECHO say about your level? What Level are you?” She takes a moment, trying to figure out how to access that, before realizing it’s on her HUD, and replies, “One. That means I’m number one, right? The best!” “Backwards, actually. Imagine it like... experience points. As you get more experience here on Pandora, then that number will go up. Those guys out there that helped us, are level 15. They have fifteen times as much power as us. If we stuck with them, we’d just weigh them down.” “O- oh... then... we gotta get strong, quick! They acted like friends, even that weird... girl. She’s a girl, right?” Anthony nods. “Yeah, even with how weird she was, she was just being nice, I know that. And I refuse to slow my friends down! Show me what to d-” A car suddenly screeches to a halt right next to the three travellers, the slick speed car painted neon, eye-breaking pink with an arousing image of Moxxi decaled onto the side facing them. “Hey, ponies! I thought you might want these, so you can use your guns and pew-pew-pew the bad guys!” Gaige yells, chucking a quartet of what look like harnesses. “Put ‘em on and turn ‘em on, they’re exo-skeletons. You can upgrade ‘em like anything else, and they’ve got hands for you! Thumbs ro~ock!” she waves and salutes, before driving off again, with Krieg running gunner and staring menacingly at the three new Vault Hunters through the one eyehole in his mask. “Well.” Anthony starts. “That was random.”