Songs: The Kills - Future Starts Slow; Crooked Still - Undone In Sorrow

"Okay. So here is what we have so far. Some Hyperion employee apparently went rogue and started shutting down Helios. Which meant the whole station collapsed. Everyone evacuated if they could and they should all be scattered around this area." Lilith said as she showed us on her little holo map.

We had called in a little team meeting, but with everyone around (except Zero who had gone off helping some people he met with a Vault) there just wasn't much room in HQ. So we decided to move to Moxxi's bar and have our team meeting there with a complimentary pizza.

"We doin' anything about them?" Salvador asked as he grabbed another slice of pizza. I hadn't even realized how much I missed Moxxi's pizza. Since Mordecai was sober, I wasn't in the bar as much as I used to be, so I also didn't get the pizza as much anymore. Today I remembered what I missed.

"Nah, son." Tina replied with her mouth full of pizza.

"Not yet. We'll try and keep an eye on the area, so we can see if they're just trying to survive or if something's up. Anyone up for recon shifts?" Lilith asked. I looked around, as the group suddenly fell very, very silent.

"Oh come on, guys. You've all been complaining about having nothing to do all day!" Lilith said.

"Yeah, but that's just nothing to do somewhere else. Out in the wilderness." Gaige replied with a shrug.

"I'll do it. Change of scenery and all. As long as I can get the time off when Anouk's coming over." I said.

"Oh my God, she's coming over? I wanna meet her, I wanna meet her, I wanna meet her!" Tina squealed.

"Is she bringing Nadia?" Gaige wanted to know.

"Aw, Mordy told me a lot about her!" Brick chimed in as well. I had no idea who to answer first. For some reason I had forgotten how difficult it got to keep things on the down low in Sanctuary.

"Yeah, she's coming over in about a week or two, depending on the ship's schedule. You can all go and meet her and I don't know if she's bringing anyone along. I can do recon until she gets here, then I might only be able to do some part time recon. That okay, Lil?" I said, hoping not to raise a bunch of other questions.

"Sure, that's fine. Mordy, you wanna do recon with Nova?" Lilith replied. Mordecai grinned and looked over at me, before crossing his arms and shaking his head.

"Pfft. Nah." he said. I laughed and rolled my eyes.

"I don't wanna work with him either. Can't stand him. Not one bit." I told Lilith jokingly. She sighed.

"Great. The two of you are gonna do recon then and Maya and Axton, you two do the night shifts. Everyone okay with that?"

"Do we really have to?" Axton complained.

"Yeah, unless you guys work out a plan amongst yourselves, so you don't have to suffer too much." Lilith answered.

"Cool. What's next on the agenda?" I wanted to know. If we got stuck on this thing, we'd never finish the team meeting. Not that I had plans or anything, I just didn't enjoy long meetings.

"Next on the agenda... well, you all probably heard of Vallory unsuccessfully trying to open the Vault. Zero was hired by some guys to finish the job and open the Vault of the Traveller right now, so yeah. That's happening." Lilith said.

"Why'd she fail?" Gaige asked.

"The gate was unstable and there were some complications or something. That's all I heard from her son. Anyway, Zero is with that other group, so if anything goes wrong, he can call us to help out. But I'd say they all got this covered." Lilith replied.

"Huh. Cool. I hope he brings back some nice loot for us." Maya mumbled in her little corner. Her hair had really grown longer since I last saw her.

"Which brings us to point three. People aren't too happy to see us all still around, now that Jack's dead. Any plans on what we can do? Like... publicity wise, I suppose?" Lilith said next.

"Well, we all knew that day would come." Mordecai mumbled.

"We can't really tell them we've been hunting down more Vault Hunters. And we can't really say that we are needed on Pandora, because there is a map with a ton of Vaults that need to be hunted." I replied.

"Yeah, that's kinda my point. What do we tell people? What do we do with the Raiders? Do we train the Raiders to run Sanctuary? Any ideas?" Lilith wanted to know. There were shrugs and questioning looks all around.

"What about the whole war business? Can't we tell them that?" Gaige asked.

"We can, but the thing is... well, how long are they going to believe that? If there is nothing happening in a year's time then it's all for nothing and they'll just get more frustrated." Lilith answered.

"Hey, what's Ellie doing here?" I chimed in, completely oblivious of the discussion that was going on. Ellie wasn't in Sanctuary very often. I barely ever saw her. And for her to come and see Moxxi - something had to be up.

"Ellie? She's here?" Lilith asked and looked up until she spotted her at the bar.

"Maybe she just came for a chat with her mom...?" Salvador suggested. There was a collective shaking of heads.

"Nah, they don't get along too well. It's gotten better, but not that good." I said, as I watched her talk to Moxxi. Looked quite serious.

"Uh oh. I got a bad feeling 'bout this. Moxxi only gets this look on her face when something bad is happening." Mordecai observed.

"How bad do you think it is?" Maya wanted to know.

"Moxxi's gonna cry." he stated matter-of-factly.

"Damn, how do you know that?" Axton asked.

"Saw her cry a lot. You might wanna disperse or something, she's gonna kick us all out if there's too many people here. Doesn't like it when people see her cry." Mordecai said to us. A few nods were exchanged and our meeting quickly dispersed. Mordecai, Lilith, Brick and I stayed in the bar, watching what was going on, until we heard a piercing high-pitched scream coming from the counter.

"Ah shit, here we go." Mordecai mumbled. We all got up and quickly walked up to the bar, where Moxxi was hiding her face behind her hands.

"Are... are you okay, Moxxi?" Lilith wanted to know. Ellie turned to us, tears streaming down her face, as she shook her head.

"Oh damn... Ellie, what's happening? What's going on?" I asked.

"You... you didn't... hear?" Ellie replied with a shaky voice. I glanced at Moxxi, who was softly sobbing now.

"Hear what?" Brick asked.

"It's... it's Scooter. He's... oh, Lord..."

Only when Moxxi's sobs started getting louder, I understood what she was trying to say. Moxxi was visibly shaking now. Mordecai walked around the counter and carefully gave her a hug.

"Ssh, it's gonna be alright, Mox..." he mumbled quietly, while I was still trying to process what had just happened.

"What?" I breathed, still not sure the information had gotten through to my brain. I just felt kind of numb.

"Scooter's... he's dead." Ellie said. Lilith was shaking her head, like she couldn't believe what she was hearing.

"But... but how?" she whispered.

"It's... a long story. There was this girl and she told us. Sent us an ECHO message." Ellie replied and wiped away a few tears.

"What... What'd it say?" Brick wanted to know.

"He... he died savin' her... her an' her friends. They were on a rocket... gettin' to that damned space station..."

"They went to Helios? Were they... were they the ones that brought Helios down?" Lilith asked.

"I... I think so. She said that... that there was some problems with the engine... they'd all have died if it wasn't for Scooter... the rockets would have exploded an' killed 'em all. They had to go out and detach 'em an' he got his hand stuck and..."

Ellie stopped and looked down, briefly wiping away some more tears. Moxxi was finally looking up at us again. She looked crushed.

"My boy, my poor little boy..." she mumbled and shook her head. I hadn't realized until now that I was crying as well. I mean... Just a few weeks ago I had been doing a race with Scooter, we had been hanging out together. Just a couple of days ago Mordecai and I went to Hollowpoint and helped him out with that health vial. I just... I just couldn't imagine Scooter being gone.

"The... the girl said she... she had to detach the rocket with... Scooter stuck to it... or they'd all have died." Ellie finished. A thought popped up in my head and it made me laugh a little, because it was such a bittersweet thing.

"He did get to go to space, like he's always been talking about. He did it." I said quietly. Ellie nodded and that was what pushed me over the edge from silent tears rolling down my face to wailing and sobbing.

"He's a hero."