OMAKE 2:

KARMA'S A BITCH (C)

Thousand Cuts was not the sort of area you went to by choice. Normally, anyway. I'd been here precisely once before, when participating in the raid on Control Core Angel. It was rocky and mountainous and bleak, and was infested with bandits in the same way that neglected dogs tended to be infested with ticks and fleas.

And yet, here I was. Angel and I had come back here, more or less voluntarily, as part of a surprise visit. Unfortunately, that meant that we had to fight through the bandits, the Slabs, in order to get to their leader, the Slab King. Thankfully, most of them recognised me from the raid on Control Core Angel, and merely offered snide remarks than violence. Any idiots who put the moves on Angel got a sweet smile, and an electric shock powerful enough to make them shit their pants. She rarely gets the chance to exercise her more overt powers, especially now that her bone marrow was producing the Eridium she needed to stay alive. She ate very little, and usually only for pleasure, or to build up her muscle from the wasted, disused things they had been when she had been imprisoned by her father. The Eridium provided her energy needs.

I pondered this as we made our way to the Slab King's 'palace'. Sirens were human women, born with tattoo-like markings that were merely the visible portion of a vast network of tissue that comprised what I had dubbed the Phase-Organ. Lore claimed that only six Sirens could exist at any one time, but I had to wonder, was that true? Or were the Sirens the beginning of a new stage in human evolution? Even with the research I was doing on the three Sirens of the Crimson Raiders, plus the autopsy I did on Steele (whose body was, admittedly, ruined by both the wound the Destroyer left her with, and the cybernetics Claptrap used on her to revive her), I was still finding more questions than answers. An exciting thing for a scientist, to be sure. But still annoying.

We eventually reached the Slab King's lair. Angel had ECHO'ed in advance, so we were expected. I was carrying, with one hand, a plastic box with a caged front. I tried not to look at the now skeletonised remains of Handsome Jack and Nisha Kadam, still in cages. And still in the rotting remnants of their clothing. It had been, what, nearly two months since I killed them?

We stopped in the middle of an arena, where, above us, a muscled hulk of a man sat, peering down at us with his piggy little eyes. A grin split his brutal, scarred features. "Come on up, Slabs," Brick said. It was an affectation of his (not that Brick would ever use the word 'affectation') to call people he trusted a Slab. I was surprised he trusted Angel and me enough to call us that.

We walked up a series of ramps that allowed us to reach the crude throne where Brick sat, flanked by his guards. "Well, this is a surprise," Brick boomed, grinning. "I didn't think you guys'd show your faces here again. 'Specially you, Angel. I mean, your old prison's not far from here."

I winced, wondering whether Angel would take offence, but she didn't. "It's fine, Brick. As long as nobody tries to put me back."

"I wouldn't do that," Brick said. "Nobody in the Crimson Raiders would, and if any of my Slabs, or Hyperion tried, I'd punch their head off. So, what's the occasion?"

"Brick, you do know it's your birthday, right?" I asked.

"Of course I do, fool!" Brick said. "It'd be a really forgetful man who forgets his own birthday. But usually, the Crimson Raiders just let me do my thing. I often get roaringly drunk…"

"Emphasis on 'roar'," I remarked.

"…And fight it out with some of the Slabs. The others haven't really sent me anything on birthdays, not since I gouged out ol' Shep Sander's eyes out and cracked his skull open(1)." Brick shrugged.

"Well, we thought we should get you something. I mean, without you and the Slabs, I wouldn't have been able to leave Control Core Angel," Angel said. "This is sort of a joint present from the Crimson Raiders, but I had to fill out all the paperwork. So to speak: Phase-shift is very useful in fast-tracking it."

Brick frowned. "What is it?"

I proffered the carrier. Brick took it, almost reverently. He knew what was inside, that was for sure, and an almost childish glee came over him as he opened the door to the carrier, and delicately fished out a small puppy. It was sleeping.

"I looked up the breed of the one Nisha killed," Angel explained. "Well, wasn't a breed so much as a mongrel, but hey. I like mongrels."

"Me too," I said. "Mongrels show genetic diversity, whereas purebreds tend to be inbred. They make the Hodunks' gene pool look deep."

"Anyway, after I found another one, we paid for every vaccination I could find. She won't even go mad from a frenzyclutch bite," Angel said.

"She? Ah, yes. Y'know, for once your creepy watching of our lives works out, Angel," Brick said, quietly. "Does she have a name?"

"Not officially, not yet. You have anything in mind?"

Brick looked down at the puppy cradled in his hands, before coming to a decision. "Yeah. Karma."

"Nice name," I remarked. "Any reason why?"

"Well, it's like the universe is paying me back for Nisha snapping Dusty's neck. And it's a beautiful name. Anyway, you said it's a she, right?"

Angel nodded. "Your point?"

Brick grinned good-naturedly. "Well, they always say that karma's a bitch. Now that's truer than ever."

OMAKE 2 ANNOTATIONS:

Originally, this chapter was titled 'Brick's Birthday', but after deciding on the puppy's name, I decided I couldn't resist the pun.

1. Shep Sanders is one of the mission providers in Borderlands. Apparently he was also the one to sell out New Haven to Hyperion, leading to Brick killing him, and being banished from the Crimson Raiders.