Disclaimer: Borderlands and all of Pandora's residents are the intellectual property of Gearbox Software. No copyright infringement intended.

Chapter 12

Angel leaves Sanctuary. She doesn't make eye contact with any of the Raiders. She doesn't make eye contact with any of the adult civilians. Here and there, she gives a faint smile to children playing on corners, or kicking balls around streets. Kids can keep secrets.

Angel drifts through the town, and out the main gate. Mr. Jones is pushing the Eridium Injector after her – four hundred and eleven pounds, it weighs. She won't have much more use for it, soon. Not much longer.

Outside the city, Angel taps at the Catch-A-Ride terminal...oh, wait, she forgot, Scooter disabled the network in a fit of petty, Momma's Boy pique. Doesn't matter. Angel phaseshifts inside the circuity, and the terminal's display flashes to life.

Angel digistructs a Technical. Mr. Jones hauls the massive Injector onto the Technical's flatbed, and ties it down with ropes and chains, and then they're off, trundling off into the Three Horns.

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It was Maya that taught Angel how to drive.

Actually, no, that's not quite correct. It was Maya that forced Angel to teach herself how to drive.

"C'mon, it's easy!" were the words she used. "Remember when I first landed at Fishguts, and you helped me hack that Catch-A-Ride? That was the first time I was ever behind a steering wheel! By the time I got to Sanctuary, I was doing corkscrews and powerslides, so c'mon. It's easy."

Maya crowded Angel into the cockpit of an Outrunner, and for several minutes, Angel was lurching and jolting across the terrain, fumbling and groping at levers and pedals, Maya sitting serenely in the turret seat all the while. And then something clicked, and Angel was thundering along the roadways, gliding around corners and flattening skags.

"Ha!" Maya said, from the turret. She couldn't see, but she knew just what sort of stupid grin was on Angel's face.

Angel wonders what Maya is doing now.

Oh, she's obviously preparing for her next bout, Angel is sure of that. Working out, sparring with trainers, eating a very specific diet. Maya doesn't live on Pandora any more. She left for good a month or so ago. Moxxi has her chasing the big bucks, now, and so she travels from system to system, fighting the best competitors that entire worlds have to offer.

Does Maya ever wonder what her friends are doing?

What if one of the clocks on Maya's echo is permanently set to Pandoran time? Every time she looks, Maya knows what her old comrades are up to. Oh, it's ten hundred hours in Sanctuary; Axton is up, Salvador and Gaige are likely still unconscious. Oh, it's fourteen hundred hours; Mordecai is probably on his third beer or so. Oh, it's twenty-one hundred hours; the Crimson Raiders are probably wondering which second-rate drinking establishment they should go to.

Angel would really like to know what Maya is doing right now. She'll always have something of the control freak in her.

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She could have used the Fast Travel, of course, but...then the Vault Hunters would know where she's going.

Oh, obviously the Vault Hunters won't be coming rushing after Angel, but...she just feels better that they don't know where she is.

Bandits attack, now and then. Angel's shield flashes and crackles as bullets smash against it. Scumbags take potshots at her from from decrepit huts and settlements as she races past. Once, a gang of marauders blockaded an overpass with a big-ass truck. She phaseshifted into their shields, and deactivated them all. Then she loosed off a dozen rounds from a Maliwan SMG, and mentally guided them into a dozen foreheads.

When it was done, Angel bowed her head, and felt sorry for herself a few moments. I would've made a really good Vault Hunter, she thought.

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Through The Dust. Angel hates the sun. Always will. She smothers herself in the most impenetrable sunblock Pandorans can buy, pulls on a cheap pair of shades and one of Gaige's hats, and then tears through the sands, a dullish-brown cloud thrown up behind her. At one point, Angel is accosted by a pair of buzzards. She phaseshifts into their simplistic auto-pilot systems, and flies them into one another.

Angel despises the heat. Angel detests the sweat pooling in her armpits and the small of her back. Angel loathes the glare of the light. It's not until she enters the Highlands, and her skin cools and her temper slakes and a cold breeze blows across her neck, that it hits her.

Oh my god.

Dad kept me fused to those machines for ten years.

When I came to Sanctuary, I hardly ever ventured beyond the city walls. Whenever I went out of Sanctuary, I was always, always with Gaige, or Maya, or Claptrap. Was I too scared to be on my own?

My friends don't know where I am.

My friends are hundreds of miles away.

I...I've never been so alone before.

I...I've never been so FREE!

The speed picks up, and the hills and the mountains of the Highlands begin flying past, faster and faster and faster. Mr. Jones grabs hold of the Technical, and tries his best not to fall off.

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Angel finds a suitable, prominent hilltop, and then brings the Technical to a halt. Big clouds are sailing over the land, trailing massive shadows over the plains and mountains. Stalkers' cries can be heard from miles away.

Eh. Angel is not the type to spare a few moments to admire an nice view. Vistas and panoramas don't really impress her.

Mr. Jones pulls a crate from the back of the Technical. He flicks a pair of latches, and then opens the lid. Eridium. Glowing purple chunks of eridium. Lots of them.

Angel gives the command, and then Mr. Jones begins feeding the eridium into the Injector.

The function of the machine is to provide Angel with a constant, steady trickle of eridium; enough to keep her alive. But Angel needs more than to simply stay alive, now. Angel needs power. Angel needs strength.

Angel phaseshifts into the Injector, and overrides the unsophisticated fail-safes that moderate the eridium flow. One quick mental command, and the substance begins gushing into Angel's system.

The neurons in Angel's brain begin catching fire.

Her pupils dilate.

A gasp escapes her mouth.

Her heart begins beating, beating, beating, faster, faster, faster.

The air in her lungs begins to seem sweeter, crisper, clearer.

Angel's mind begins racing at a thousand miles a second.

Angel's blood begins singing, a thousand voices a drop.

For a few seconds, Angel stands and gapes with wide eyes and open mouth, staring at the hills and the boulders and the rivers and the sky.

And then she begins laughing, and cannot stop.

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Without the aid of eridium, Angel's phaseshift ability has a maximum range of about three hundred metres, tops.

With eridium? Ten miles. Twenty miles. A hundred. Depends on how much you pump into her.

Angel snarls under her breath. Darn it. It takes her longer than she would like to regain her composure. It's been almost a year since she was last injected with a non-medically-necessary dose of this stuff. It's hard to concentrate, hard to keep your mind on the task at hand, when you're under this kind of buzz...

Almost a year since her father died...

Angel initiates phaseshift. A thousand mental tendrils flow outwards in every direction, rushing through the air, ready to do a Siren's work.

Angel is sitting cross-legged on the roof of the Technical's hull. She's extending her mind across the entirety of the Highlands – a hundred miles, two hundred, three hundred.

Angel locates every New-U Station in the region.

She forces her way inside.

She bends them all to her will.

Now, all the New-U systems in this area belong to Angel.

Every time a bandit or a mercenary or a dumbass civilian gets killed, a significant portion of their money will find its way into Angel's bank account.

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Of course, this is not a state of affairs that suits Hyperion.

Hyperion is always quick to respond. The moon base is, after all, hanging directly over the planet. Before long, Angel hears the tell-tale whistle of very large objects shooting through the air from orbit, and the equally tell-tale crash of massive lumps of metal hammering into the earth.

Loaders begin rising to their feet, their gun sights coming to rest on Angel.

"Unauthorized transactions detected. Freeloader identified. Moving to engage."

Hyperion technology. How boringly unchallenging. Angel reaches into the positronic brain of each individual Loader, and brings it under her thrall. It's not long before she has built up a small battalion around her.

Next, Hyperion tries sending humans – soft, squishy humans with their soft, squishy flesh and their easily-breakable bones. Combat Engineers. Hyperion Infiltrators. Hyperion Hawks.

"Hey, who the hell is screwing with our New-Uaaaarrrghhh!"

Sometimes, Angel commands the troops' weapons to self-destruct, blowing their startled owners up. Sometimes, Angel commands the troops' shields to rapidly contract, crushing them inside. Most of the time, Angel simply lets her Loaders shoot them to little raggedy bits.

Eventually, Hyperion begins sending Constructors, and Angel sighs. Finally.

Angel seizes control of the Constructors, and begins digistructing herself the fastest, most efficient, most spacious transport vessel she can devise.

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Thirty-two hours after leaving Sanctuary, Angel hasn't the strength to remain awake any longer. She crawls into a sleeping alcove, pulls a blanket over herself, activates the auto-pilot, and lays her head on the pillow.

Angel never bothered naming her new spacecraft. She hasn't the humour at the moment.

The vessel is not much of a fighter, and wouldn't last long in a skirmish against pirates or criminals. Fortunately, before she left Pandora behind, Angel commandeered four extremely scary Hyperion space fighters. If said pirates or criminals take a liking to her ship, they'll have to deal with her escort.

The cargo hold is full of eridium. Before departure, Angel raided one of Hyperion's secret stores north of the Ashes. There's enough in the hull now to last her for months – provided she can regulate, of course. Provided she doesn't binge again, like in the Highlands.

Hyperion has its corporate headquarters on a world called Titan Lux. From Pandora, it's about six weeks' travel. Angel made sure to bring plenty of echo sims.

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"Angel? Where the hell have you been?"

"I'm fine. Don't worry about me."

"W-worry? Uh, we all thought you'd died! Everyone's been out all day, looking for you! Freakin' Lilith mobilized the entire frickin' Crimson Raiders to go pull apart the Three Horns to find you."

"Oh, I'm sorry. You shouldn't have done that. I'm fine."

"Where are you? And how come the signal's so crummy?"

"Well...I'm...I'm in space."

"Huh?"

"I'm in space. I...digistructed a space-faring vessel, and now I'm...I'm en route to a world called Titan Lux."

Gaige stares at Angel through the screen. She just gazes at her, and gradually Angel begins to feel uncomfortable.

"Titan Lux," Angel says, helpfully. "It's, umm, it's where I'm going..."

Gaige's pigtails have a rather dejected way of hanging from their owner's head. Angel notices Gaige's nostrils beginning to subtly flare. Angel notices Gaige's eyes flicking here and there, anger burning just behind them. Angel notices Gaige's lips, pressing more and more tightly together.

Angel is wearing pyjamas. Despite the fact that there's several million miles between them, Angel is feeling somewhat vulnerable at the moment.

"You're leaving?" Gaige says, at last.

"You have to trust me," Angel says. "I can't explain it all at the moment, but you must have faith in me. There's a way to save the Vault Hunters, but to do so, I must travel to Titan Lux."

Gaige peers at Angel. A ripple of static flows across the screen.

And then:

"The last time we trusted you, Sanctuary's shields went down," Gaige says. She chews her own cheek for a moment. "Hey, Angel? Tell Maya I said hi."

Gaige reaches to her side, and then the feed cuts out, and Angel is alone in her cabin, staring in surprise at a blank blue screen. Mr. Jones is floating in the corner. He has nothing to say.

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Titan Lux is a very different world than Pandora. To begin with, Angel is fully expecting to be confronted by a whole fleet of police fighters the moment she enters the territory.

She's mistaken. Her vessel comes within range of the planet, and remains completely ignored.

Strange. No police interference. No communications from authorities on the surface.

Someone is expecting her.

More than four hundred intergalactic conglomerates have their headquarters on Titan Lux.

On Titan Lux, skyscrapers can rise two, three miles above the ground.

On Titan Lux, when night comes, entire continents are bathed in white light.

On Titan Lux, untold legions of directors and chairmen and accountants and lawyers do business in enormous, luxurious offices, and then dine in the most opulent restaurants.

On Titan Lux, the police are the most well-trained, well-equipped law-keeping force in the galaxy. They have a lot of rich people to protect.

On Titan Lux, Angel's father could never quite convince the elite that he belonged among them.

Angel guides her ship through orbit, and then descends to the surface. No echo messages, demanding that she slow down, or stop, or identify herself. No police vessels coming to blast her out of the sky. Here and there, Angel can see rivers of moving lights; highways of flying vehicles, carrying the population about.

Angel flies to a city called Munificence. Somewhere among the immense confusion of light and concrete stands Hyperion's main headquarters. Two-and-a-half miles from street level to the top. Seven hundred and fifty floors. One-hundred-and-six thousand windows. A massive Hyperion logo on the north side.

On one of the tower's roofs, Angel finds a landing pad. She manoeuvres into position, and then, after six weeks of travel, her vessel finally comes to a rest.

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"The Prodigal Daughter returns!"

Angel groans, and rolls her eyes. She knew he'd say that. She knew he'd say that.

There were men in very expensive suits waiting for her on the roof. Very friendly. Very sycophantic. They welcomed her, and bid her enter. Angel was led through a series of astoundingly extravagant ballrooms and conference halls and office complexes,until finally the sycophants pushed open a pair of oak doors, revealing a magnificent, and yet painstakingly-tasteful, study.

Jeffrey Blake was there, waiting for her.

He had been waiting for Angel for a very long time.

"Let me guess," Blake says, clasping his hands behind his back, and pacing around the perimeter of the room. "Having spent six weeks cooped up in a cramped little spaceship, with nothing for company but that slow-witted droid behind you, and nothing to occupy your mind but those mind-numbing echo sims that kids these days love ever so much, you're probably not in the mood for any manner of pleasant conversational fripperies, are you?"

Angel gives Blake a sour look. She's tired, and dishevelled, and part of her hates Blake for not allowing Hyperion to fall into ashes in her absence. "I want what is rightfully mine," she says. "My...my dad left me this company, and I want it."

A dreadful fire leaps to life in Blake's eyes, and his thin lips twist to form an altogether unsettling smile. "Yes," he breathes. "You've come to claim your inheritance. You've come to take what's yours. And I will ensure that it comes to you!"

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Blake motions for the others to vanish. A secret button is pressed, and a bookshelf slides out of place, revealing a secret passage.

Blake leads Angel through a series of corridors and hallways. All dark. All eerily quiet. All filled with wires and cables and computers and dead, black displays.

"Various shareholders and directors are still squabbling over control of Hyperion," Blake says, calling back over his shoulder. "Oh, I am looking forward to when they meet you!"

Through a doorway, and into a great cavernous space of metal and echoes.

Mr. Blake flicks a switch, and the chamber is filled with light.

Walls, covered with lifeless monitors.

Wires, hanging like vines from the ceiling.

Pipes, snaking and twisting across the floor.

And, at the centre of the chamber...a throne.

Welcome home, Princess.

Mr. Blake stands back. He puts his hands in his pockets, and silently waits as Angel gazes at her inheritance.

A throne of steel. A massive contraption hangs over the throne, with three huge pipes projecting outwards. Eridium Injectors. This assembly would infuse Angel with enough eridium to extend her consciousness over the entire breadth of Hyperion. From this lonely, dark place, she could rule over an empire.

Angel's mind wanders.

She remembers climbing into a Technical with Gaige, and speeding out across the Horns.

She remembers Maya training her. Handguns, sniper rifles, meditation.

She remembers six-hour echo sim marathons.

She remembers screaming crowds at the Torgue Arena.

She remembers Moxxi, winking at her.

She remembers gobbling down ice cream and soda, and disbelieving amazement at how such things could soften painful memories.

She remembers the nightlife at Sanctuary, and how she could rarely summon the courage to participate, but it was always so fascinating to just watch.

Angel laughs silently to herself, and then Angel remembers that Mr. Blake is standing directly behind her.

"I will need eridium," Angel says.

"You will have eridium," Blake replies, quick as a flash.

Angel nods,and her eyes harden. As soon as she is in control of Hyperion, a billion dollars will be deposited into the Vault Hunters' joint account. A contingent of ships and engineers will arrive to offer whatever help they need.

The Vault Hunters will get to Arius. Angel will make sure of it.