You take in your surroundings as you enter the arena. The walls and floors and entire apparatus were a remarkable shade of blue. There were ammo-stocked vending machines, as usual. And, like the border outside, there's flashing lights, and the walls have the 'TORGUE' emblem painted on them. You're distracted, though, as Piston echoes in.
"Now, usually your first match would be against a single opponent, but I thought: eh. Instead, you're gonna be fighting a few dozen chumps called the Horde of Horrors. Now, I could kick their asses with both pecs tied behind my back, but you'll want to take it easy."
So, with that, you stand in front of the main door to the arena. You look around at the others, but none of them return your gaze. They're all just staring forward, looks of unsureness upon them. Except for Maya, who was grinning in a way that was kind of really creepy.
"Ladies and Gentlemen, it looks like our next combatant has arrived! Does the Vault Hunter have what it takes to survive the Appetite for Destruction round? I think we all know the answer: MAAAAAAAYBEEE. The rules are simple. Use the provided loot and kill everybody! The last fighter standing is a bonafide badass!" Torgue yells through the echo frequency, "Go to the center of the arena when you're ready to start!"
The shutter door opens, and you step forward. The arena's pretty big. There's some waist high cover here and there, some loot chests. It was pretty cool. Aaaaand the audience is huuuge!
So cool.
You reach the center, and Torgue starts up again,
"Ladies and gentlemen, this is the moment you've all been waiting for: The Horde of Horros VS the Vault Hunter! FIGHT!"
And with that, they're all over the place! You jump forward, blasting your double barreled shotgun at one of the assholes. When you reach the ground, he's running towards you, but another shot does the trick.
"Booyah!" You yell, turning around and watching for a moment. Maya's already phaselocking one of them, and shooting repeatedly. Krieg's running around like a maniac, but he's doing pretty awesome, taking out, like, a lot of guys. Salvador's gunzerking – And Zer0's whole disappeary ninja thing – So cool. And then there's Axton, with his turret and his E-Tech Sniper Rifle, taking out the ones who were only just entering the arena.
"Wave complete, but don't get too comfortable," Torgue shouts over the audience, "Next wave, bitches!"
"Wha...?" You whisper, mostly to yourself.
You look around as everyone begins firing again, restarting their action skills and switching out guns. You stand there like an idiot and -
Oh. Here was you, getting shot in the back.
That's what you get for not paying attention.
You let out a yell, before summoning Death Trap, and rushing forward, switching out the shotgun for your rocket launcher. Oh, this would be amazing! Ahahahaha!
"Take this, you ugly mother -" You're cut off by the intense kick and even more intense sound of the thing. It blasts, sending you backwards a few feet, and the guy you hit as well. Yeah, he was dead.
Unfortunately, you run out of ammo, like, really fast. Laaame. You switch it out for your incendiary assault rifle and begin firing rapidly, and you're caught off guard as you hear Piston -
"Holy crap, are you still fighting those idiots? You're gonna have to pick up the pace if you wanna be Piston's partner."
This kind of pisses you off, more than a little bit. You take out your SMG, and grin as you kill, well, tons of guys. You let out some maniacal laughter, yelling, "Die!"
What. You're not creepy.
"Another wave down, better get some ammo!" You run towards the center, to one of the ammo dispensers, grabbing some before rushing back to your original spot. On the way up, you pass Axton, and the two of you automatically know to high five. It's hella cool, "It's time for another wave!"
With Torgue's announcement of that, you rush to the center, peering through the scope on your SMG, and trying to figure out where most of them were coming from. You see a ton coming from the left, so you begin firing.
"I am the strongest girl alive!" You shout, beginning to collect, well, a lot of stacks. Stackage was fantastic, alright? Like, seriously, who needs accuracy? For real? Not you.
You see that Krieg's down, in fight for your life, and you're about to go help him, when you see Maya sending out a phaselock revive. He gets up, and shouts, "I'LL MAKE MEAT BICYCLES FOR THE PRETTY LADY!" You swear you catch Maya giggle, and, well, it was kind of rad. Watching them interact was always interesting. For one main reason: You guys all pretty much think Krieg's insane – He's a psycho, after all. And based on the way he acted and the things he said, he clearly didn't really have a mind. That was the whole point of psychos, right?
Well, Maya didn't seem to think so. She always tried communicating with him, even though he was only able to reply with stuff about meat bicycles and nipple salads and...poop trains and – Well, yeah. That was really it. Weird stuff. But she never really stopped trying to get him to say normal things – And sometimes, he almost did.
You charge forward, with the others, all shooting at the same last one. He goes down not a second later, and looking around, it really seemed to be over. You stop for a moment, panting and wiping the sweat from your brow.
And...Not a second later there's more.
Goddammit.
"That was BRUTAL! Where's the ref?"
Your SMG's out of ammo, so you switch to your shotgun again, running to where Axton was...Because there were a ton of them on that side. That was the only reason why, okay?
"Hey!" You call, out of breath, shooting at one that was coming from his right. He jumps, only noticing when you kill him, and looking at you, giving a small chuckle before going to shoot another.
"Hey!" He replies, though he doesn't make eye contact, as he's looking through the scope of his sniper rifle, shooting one that was about to hit Zer0, "Fancy meeting you here. Nice shot, by the way."
"Thanks!" You reply, killing another in one shot. You were such a BA.
"The Vault Hunter's chewing through waves like a fat kid through a cookie store! NOW I WANT COOKIES!"
"Hey, you wanna grab some cookies after this?" You call to Axton.
"Hell yeah!" He replies, noticeably grinning.
"It's the final wave! Don't die now!" Torgue calls, and you're pumped up now. This was it, kill the rest, and you guys would be like, totally a bit further to being Pandora's Number 1 badass, even if it only ranked you, like, one lower. It'd still be something...! What!
Unprofessional, you decide to take this opportunity to run about and let the others know about the upcoming cookie escapade. This was important. You take out two on the way to Maya.
You're behind her now, and you're doing one of those cool back-to-back shooting things.
"Hey, we're doing cookies after this! You in?"
"That sounds like fun," She calls, smiling as she throws an explosive grenade, taking out two at once. You dash over to Zer0, and tell him the same thing.
":D" Appears on his helmet. Cute. You jump to dodge a bullet, and like a slow motion movie, you swear you see the thing fly right underneath your feet. So fucking cool! You're at Salvador's side now, and you lean down, to match his height.
"Hey, we're getting cookies after this! Sound good?"
"Aha, cookies!" He yells, gunserking all at the same time, "Gracias, amigo!"
You're about to run over to Krieg, but you're seriously wondering if that's a good idea or not.
Do it for Maya, you decide.
"Krieg!" You call, running over. He turns to look at you, and tilts his head, in a confused manner, "We're all gonna get some cookies after this, okay?"
He stares at you for a long time, and you're not entirely sure if you should say anything else or not. As you're about to walk away, he yells,
"ANUS COOKIE DOUGH!"
Well, uh, you'd take that as a yes.
"OH MY GOD, That was BADASS!" Torgue calls, and you look over, to see Axton and his lovely turret taking out an enormous amount of assholes. Nice. You quickly summon DT again, and watch as he flies over to – Wait, is that the last guy? All of you stop, and watch as he bitch slaps the dude, his super sweet digistruct claws killing him instantly! The crowd goes wild! And you've never in your life felt so, well, badass!
"DING DING DING. That's it – The Vault Hunter wins and has now LEAPED up to rank number FIVE on the leaderboards! MEEDLYMOW!"
Rank number five? Holy shit. You look around, desperately needing to fist bump someone! Zer0's the closest to you, and you decide to take your chances. You jog over, holding out your first,
"Fist bump?"
He stares at you for a while, or at least, looks in your general direction, before speaking in haiku.
"A fist bump sounds good/We are number five badass/We surely earned it," And with that, he bumps his fist to yours. Fucking awesome.
"Piston is proud of you. I've arranged for the stagehands to deliver some guns to you – Take them. Piston thinks this will be the start of a beautiful relationship," And with that, he echoes out. Creep. But hey, free guns, right?
You walk over to the chest, along with everyone else. It opens up, and -
"Pahahaha! I'm not going to share the Vault's prize with some no-name mercenaries. I am the greatest fighter who has ever lived. I will open the Vault myself. And you," The arena begins smoking, a green fog filling up the surrounding area, "Will get the hell out of my arena. That noise you're hearing is the arena filling up with Harmstrong gas. I've turned off the cameras – Just breathe deep and pass out. Like a good little coward."
Oh HELL no. You keep your mouth closed, holding your breath as you wave your arm and begin running for the exit. The others run behind you, and you all make it out.
You allow yourself to breathe again, and it comes out quite heavy. Holding your breath's a challenge, dude.
"What happened to the camera feed? Why do I hear gas? Did somebody drag the Vault Hunter away? I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT'S GOING ON!"
So, Torgue's flipping out, which is understandable. You look around at the others. The building you've ended up in is strange. There's a couple chests, some lockers, etc. You all stock up on ammo, sell a couple guns. Do the usual. There's a stairway, and you all make your way up. It leads you to a new floor that pretty much looks exactly the same – Probably because it's in the same room. No, literally, you could still see the previous floor from over the railing. However, - OH SHIT. Sorry. Lack of attention span. There's a dude shooting at you.
You grab your shotgun, reloading, as it was low on ammo – And quickly activating discord, as to not lose any stacks. Thank God for discord, seriously. You guys kill the dudes pretty quickly, and find a Fast Travel Station.
Of course, it just leads to the Badass Crater of Badassitude.
Time to continue on, you suppose. You'll need a new sponsor if you wanna win this shiz.
AN: hey guys! sorry i took a few days to get this up, tried to make this one a bit longer to make up for that. hope you enjoy!