Chapter 6

Pandora

They left Boomtown and headed across the road to where the Catch-A-Ride station was sitting. As soon as they were past the gates Artemis asked "Did you catch any of that?"

"You mean the job? Course I did, there's an art to figuring out a job like that. Do enough of them, and you get used to it. She wants us to find some dynamite, which we can get from some of the suicide psychos, but we need to take them by surprise so that they don't set it off themselves. Then we need some form of timer. She didn't know where to find one, but figured that we might be able to spot something in the field, especially since we're both tech people. Last, she needs something to store it all in so that it will be protected from the elements, not to mention look like her work, so she wants us to retrieve some shipment that got intercepted. The other two were kinda self-explanatory."

"Yeah, I kinda got them, but the rest of it was a mystery to me."

"Figured, but she marked my ECHO, so we should be able to find it without much difficulty, though it is a bit of a trek." Gaige said while imputing what she wanted into the Catch-A-Ride screen, moments later a Technical formed on the pad and before she hopped into the driver's seat, she added "Much as I'd love to see your driving again, I got it this time."

Artemis deflated slightly, causing Deathtrap to pat her shoulder and help her up into the back. As soon as she was settled, they tore out of there.

As they traveled, Artemis took in the sights of the area, especially since they would be going to somewhere she hadn't been before, but soon enough, the endless tan dirt and dark rocks got boring. Not even the occasional thump of a Skag getting run over, or the screech of a Rakk could elect any excitement from her, so she turned to the cab and leaned in to talk.

"Are we there yet?"

"What are you, five?"

"I was kidding, but about how far is it?"

"It's a ways, looks to be closer to the Highlands then anywhere around here, so sit back and relax, or you could hop your way up here if you want."

"I'm good for now."

"Suit yourself." Gaige shrugged before taking her eyes off the road for a moment and glancing at the other girl and saying "What? And don't give me any of that, what what stuff, I know you well enough to know that you've got something on your mind, actually, you've had something on your mind for a while now, so spit it out."

Artemis mulled for a few seconds and then said "What do you have against A.I. ngel?"

"What? I haven't got anything against her."

"You act like you do, I mean, you were awfully anxious to get her off the ship, and even before that, you were acting a bit odd around her."

Now it was Gaige's turn to mull. She couldn't admit what it really was, especially when she wouldn't even admit it to herself, but the truth was, she was jealous. Not jealous of anything the girl had in particular, but jealous of the attention she would get, the way she seemed to weave her way into the ship, into things that Gaige had taken for granted, like the bed, or their adventures and that made her feel nervous, which might have been a better way to describe it. She was worried that the girl would disrupt what they had going, which had barely recovered from the damage Gaige had done to it and with things on such shaky ground, she was worried that the new girl would take her place, that she might be able to offer Artemis something that Gaige couldn't. At the very least, she hadn't screwed up royally recently. But Gaige couldn't even face that truth herself, so how was she supposed to convey it to her friend?

"Well, like I said, I was worried about her getting hurt."

"That's not it, at least not all of it."

Gaige sighed and focused on the road while she gathered her thoughts, she knew that she needed to be honest if she was ever going to get things repaired. Things were much better now then they'd been for a while, but that still didn't mean that all had been forgiven and Gaige knew that it wouldn't take much for everything to fall apart once more, so she mulled it over as the terrain slid past.

Eventually she spoke up in a soft voice, barely audible over the sound of the engine. "It's stupid, I know, but I guess I was worried that she would take my place, that you liked her better than me. I mean, certain things that I thought were special, just for us, she was being invited to take part in and I kinda got, I donno if I'd say offended? That's not right, and it wasn't jealousy, at least not entirely, but it was like she was just getting invited in without having to try to do all the things I had to work for. And I know that I'm on shaky ground, that I don't really have a place to speak, but I didn't want her to take my place."

"She couldn't take your place."

"I know that, but, I guess I'm not saying this right, but it was like you were spending so much time catering to her, that I was feeling kinda pushed to the side. And I know that rationally it was that we'd been the only two before, so all the time was just us and that she was just taking part of it, but it felt like I was drifting away, that more and more, I wasn't part of the conversation, part of the team and I panicked. Well, that and got mad, which I seem to do a lot. And, not to put anything more on you, but I was having a hard time of it, the alcohol, I mean. I know you got rid of all the booze on the ship, but I still was wanting it bad, and you were spending time with your new friend, but I needed someone to lean on right then, so I started worrying."

"I'm sorry."

"You don't have anything to be sorry about."

"Sure I do. You're my friend, and I was neglecting you. I knew you were having a hard time, but I didn't think that much about it. And I didn't realize you were feeling left out, I should've talked to you more. But I gotta say, you're way more open and, what's the word, rational about this? That feels wrong. Level headed? Eh, close enough. You're more open and level headed about this stuff then when we first met, so I'm glad you spoke up."

"Yeah, well, Deathtrap's been on my case about it, plus some of those ECHO meetings stressed the importance of making sure that your friends and family know what's going on with you, so create strong bridges of communication with them, so I've been working on it."

"Well, you're doing good."

"Thanks."

"Urgurrr" Deathtrap added, patting Gaige on the shoulder.

Smiling back at him, she said "Thanks babe. Well, it's gonna be a long ride, before I ask if you've got any other things you wanna talk about, babe, root beer me."

A Number of Hours Later

Gaige fell out of the driver's side door, groaning loudly. She pushed herself into a near standing position, still hunched over for a few seconds, before slowly straightening out and stretching. Everything had gone stiff from the hours driving. She didn't remember the last time she'd driven that long, and nothing against Ellie, but the seats could use an upgrade.

Finishing pushing on her spine back into place, she sighed and looked around. For the last while, the terrain around them had been gradually changing, going from dusty, rocky plains to a craggier one, with bits of green popping up, until it had finally taken hold and stretched out around them.

She glanced over at the other two, Artemis was yawning and stretching herself out, reminding Gaige of some cat that had just woke up. To her amazement, the other girl had fallen asleep about an hour ago, despite the bouncing of the hot metal bed she'd been in.

Deathtrap just shook his head and floated over to Gaige. He was fine, they hadn't run into any problems on their way, in fact, they hadn't seen any bandits for the last two hours, which had set them both on edge, another reason for Artemis falling asleep being weird to them.

"That was a long drive." Artemis said, dropping out of the back and looking around "You sure this is the right place?"

"How would you know how long it was, you slept through part of it." Gaige couldn't keep the bitter comment inside, not that she tried all that hard.

Artemis shrugged "Get whatever sleep you can, when and where you can. Weren't you Vault Hunters the same?"

"Yeah, but the back of a Technical? These things ain't known for their shocks."

"Eh, not the weirdest place I've taken a nap."

"And where was that?"

"The duct of a ship. What? I don't remember where it was, but I was hunting something that had caused a ship to crash on some planet, and I was trying to pick up its trail, but night fell just after I'd found the ship, so I slipped into the ducts and used my pack to barricade one way and a fan was blocking the other, so I took a nap."

"You know something, you're weird. And I mean that in the best possible way."

"Thanks, I think?"

Gaige nodded and looked around. "But to answer your earlier question, we're almost where Tina marked on the map."

"And she couldn't find anywhere closer? You know, I think she just wanted us to kill that Pollux person for her and used this as an excuse."

"Hey, that's no way to talk about my friends. Even if it's probably true, it's no way to talk about them."

"Sorry."

Gaige just shook her head, saddened by the fact that the other girl wasn't getting it.

"So, uh, where are we going, and what's around here?"

Gaige looked over and replied "How would I know?"

"Well, you've got the map, and, well, you've been here before."

"Not here I haven't."

"Oh, the way you mentioned the Highlands, I thought you might've, sorry."

"Stop saying you're sorry. And I have been to the Highlands, but I never got out this way while there. I was just saying it was closer to here was all. That said, we should get going as soon as possible, unless you've got something else to add, more questions perhaps?"

Gaige had meant it to be a way of opening up discussion between them, but from the way the other girl reacted, she realized that she thought she was being sarcastic or mean, so she was grateful when Deathtrap chimed in.

"Ugurru"

"Great idea babe, I am a bit hungry, though I suppose we should keep it light, since we're no doubt about to hit some combat."

Artemis quickly got to work, pulling food out of her pack like she could finally be useful for something, while looking like she was kicking herself for not thinking of it herself.

"I'd thought with everything that happened in the Garden of Minos, you'd gotten more assertive, more willing to talk back to me, so what's up?"

"Oh, uh, it's just that, well, you had to do all the driving, so I should've thought to have something to eat ready for when we stopped, but I didn't think of it."

"Yeah, well, neither did I, so there's that."

"But I shouldn't have to rely on you so much."

"Nothing wrong with relying on others. Not that I'm one to talk, I mean, the last time I really relied on anyone but Deathtrap or you was almost eight years ago, so let's just both try and work on it shall we. So, what's for lunch?"

Artemis held up two sandwiches, handing one of them to Gaige, who tore into it like a starving person. Neither of them savored their food too much, especially not out in enemy territory like this, the downside of living under fire, like sleep, food was taken where and when it could be and no amount of time would change that part of them.

They quickly finished and washed the meal down before looking at the nearest crag stretching up and Gaige said "Well, looks like we're on foot from here."

"I think there's a way up over there." Artemis pointed.

Gaige trusted her eyes, so she let her lead the way and quickly spotted the path she was talking about, though calling it a path was being generous. It was really more of a narrow, steep, rock slide, though the way the other girl bound up it, made it look like it was a gentle staircase.

For her part, Gaige managed to scramble up it only with much sweating and swearing, but she got to the top. Throwing herself onto the grass, she still managed to look around, making sure that they were alone, when she spotted something off in the distance.

"Hey, what's that?"

"Not sure. Seems to be some kind of building, or at least it was at one point, now I think that's where our bandits are."

"Nah, they should be off that way a bit more."

"Huh, then they must have something there, cause there's a fair number of buildings and barricades set up on it."

Pushing herself up, Gaige dug out the scope from her pack and took a look. The other girl had been right, it did seem to be a bandit camp built on something else, and it took her a while, but she still recognized it.

"Damn, that's an old Hyperion building."

"You sure?"

"Course I'm sure. You know how many of those things I saw the first time I was here? Yeah, well, neither do I, but suffice to say, it was a lot."

"So, what do you wanna do?"

"Hmm." Gaige thought about it. Their target would'nt be there, though they might find something useful, but it would be a danger that they didn't need, so it would be better to not go. "I think we shouldn't kick the Rakk Hive unless we have to."

"I agree, though it might have something we could use for the timer."

"Damn, I hadn't thought of that. Still, I think we should hit the other camp first, see what we can get, and then come back and hit this one if we need to."

"I can live with that."

"Great, so let's go."

They skirted wide around the base, trying not to be seen as they made their way towards their target, when Artemis suddenly stiffened and made a hand motion for them to stop.

After long, tense moments where nothing happened, Gaige moved slowly up to where the other girl was crouched. As soon as she was near, Artemis motioned to what she was looking at and the instant Gaige saw it, she let out an involuntary groan.

"Stalkers."

She watched the lizard-like creatures climb down the pillars that had once held a bridge, which had long since fallen and shattered. She kicked herself, she should've known, they were all over this area the last time she'd been here, but she'd put it out of her mind. She'd been so focused on the bandits, that she hadn't thought about what else there might be.

"We should go around." Artemis whispered back. Gaige nodded her agreement and they started following the edge of the ravine, moving even more cautiously than before.

As they went, Gaige started spotting the familiar signs of Stalkers in the area, the disgusting purple piles that they excreted, the strange blobs and strands hanging from everything. It all took her back, but it wasn't a pleasant trip down memory lane. She'd never been fond of Stalkers. It wasn't that her Anarchy didn't work on them, if anything, her fighting style made dealing with them easier for her than anyone else, but she still didn't like them. She didn't know why, it might have been something about how they moved, or how they reminded her of a bug on Eden 5, but whatever it was, she didn't like them from the start.

That dislike had only intensified when she'd been pinned down by one during her Vault Hunting time. She'd been careless, too busy showing off to pay attention around her, so while the rest of the Vault Hunters were taking care of a badass, she'd been casually killing the rest of them, but had missed one of them sneaking up on her. Normally, her bullets would've taken care of it even if she hadn't been aware of it, but she'd been getting as close to them as possible and firing point blank, so there'd been no extra shots. She'd just finished all of them that she knew of, when she got hit from behind and pinned under it. She could just get her head around to look at it, but all she could see was the inside of its mouth as it tried to bite her. To her shame, she'd shrieked like a little girl and thrashed futilely underneath it, but hadn't done anything but amuse it. She'd thought she would die there, Deathtrap had been too far away to help, but in the end, it was Maya who'd heard her and yanked the Stalker off with her Phaselock, though she did chew Gaige out for an hour or so when they got back to base.

Also not helping was the bizarre experiment that Dr. Zed had conducted in trying to splice creatures together, but that was a whole different kind of nightmare.

It wasn't long before they were away from that Stalker den and moving across the open plain. Gaige was glad to be away, even as she wished she had a vehicle, not just to make going faster, but to go back and run each and every Stalker over. Then back up to make sure the job was finished.

As she fantasized about that, Artemis stopped.

Getting her mind back on the task at hand, she looked around to see what was up and quickly spotted the sign that had drawn the girl's attention.

It had once been painted with the familiar Stalker warning, but at some point, someone had roughly painted over that and had replaced it with what appeared to be a stenciled-on image of a blond girl under a blue Skag, though it looked like they'd thrown paint at the stencil rather than trying to get an even coat. It didn't take much to piece together who it was supposed to be, not just cause the blond had bunny ears, but because painted across the top of the sign was 'Tina does it Skaggy style'.

"Well, I can see why she wanted this guy to die." Artemis muttered. "His art's terrible."

Gaige blinked and took a second to realize the other girl was kidding, or at least partially, the art was terrible. "I'm gonna tell Tina you said that."

"I was kidding."

"I know, and it's good you're loosening up a bit, but that was bad."

"Well, so's this, I'm reluctant to call it art, besides, what did you expect me to say?"

"About what you said."

"Then what's wrong?"

"Nothing, I was kidding as well. And you're right, the art is terrible, I mean, without the caption I doubt I would've figured out who that was supposed to be."

"I know, right."

"Still, we should probably do something about this sign."

"Such as? Cause just for the record, I don't have any paint in my pack."

"Really? I thought you might considering everything else you pack."

"Are you still on that?"

"Nah, but I had hoped. Guess the best we can do is just destroy it, babe, you wanna do the honors?"

"Urru" Came the reply as the floating death machine slashed the sign in half before knocking the pieces down.

Satisfied, they made their way on. It wasn't long before they ran into another couple signs, with almost identical 'art', though the splatter patterns were different and tags like 'Bunny and the Skag' or 'What happens when a Skag catches a bunny' though they thought the last one was a bit forced. Still, the art seemed to be improving, since they could at least identify who it was supposed to be by the picture, not that they didn't destroy every one of them.

It didn't take long for them to start climbing one of the hills and when they came to the top, they were faced with a sharp drop-off, leading to a valley crawling with Stalkers, and across the way, was the bandit camp they were after.