First off, Gearbox and 2K studios own Borderlands and I have absolutely NO claim to the title or the characters of Borderlands. I just thought I would put my own twist on characters and events. I hope you enjoy it.

Ok another chapter with more dialogue blah, blah, blah. I put some humor in this chapter among other things, but I promise the next chapter will be full of action.

Chapter 2: Rude Awakenings

An alarm sounds, bringing the comatose commando to a groggy state of awareness. Axton had slept hard, and on his stomach no less. "Great, now my back hurts," he groans while rolling to his side as the artificial lights begin to brighten. The faint sound of a toilet flushing and water running in the background fills his ears. His eyes flutter open and are momentarily blinded by the light, causing him to wince and turn his head. "Another morning, another headache," he thinks, rubbing his eyes. A shadow moves and stops in front of him. "That's weird. Why do I have the distinct, uneasy feeling that I'm being watched?" His hand slides to the magnum repeater under his pillow and he slowly opens his eyes.

"Sonofa—!" Axton rolls off the other side of the bed and raises his pistol from a kneeling position. Hovering over the side of the bed where he was sleeping is a tall, slim, black armored figure with a sword raised ready to strike. The opaque visor on the helmet identifies the man easily making Axton's temper flare. "What the hell man!? I nearly shot you just now!" The man doesn't move. "Zero! Hello?" Not even a twitch. Annoyed, Axton walks around the bed, cautiously, and pokes him; his finger goes right through and the man flickers out of existence. "Wait a second..."

"Good morning."

The commando visibly jumps at the metallic voice directly behind him. "Ah, dammit! I knew that would happen," he says and turns around to find Zero laughing, actually laughing, a red smiley emoticon hovering over his visor. The pistol gets tossed on the bed and Axton crosses his arms. He takes several deep breathes to calm himself before asking, "Why. The. Hell. Do I wake up to find an assassin ready to cut me in half this morning?" The irritation on his face makes the laughter reside to a chuckle and finally a 'HA HA' emote. Axton had to admit, it was funny, however, the humor was lost on him at the moment. "And why were you using my bathroom?"

Zero regains his composure. "Lilith told me/Awaken the others/We have a briefing," he informs Axton with his usual poetic speech. He clears his throat, which sounds strange with the metallic edge to it. "Also, I had to go."

"So that's how you wake people up?" Axton gestures. "You nearly gave me a heart attack. I almost put a whole clip into your hologram, man. You could've at least woken me up like—"

Zero raises his hand to cut him off. "But a simple prank/Easy revenge for me/After what you tried to do." He points to his visor.

"Wait...What did I do?" Zero just crosses his arms.

"Your not still mad about...Oh come on. You never take that mask off!" His anger is gone now, replaced by defensiveness. "You had to have known me and Maya would try it eventually."

Now it's Zero's turn to be upset. "I suspected it/But not at that moment/I was—"

"Hungover?" The sight of a '_' emote makes him chuckle. "I wish I could've seen the look on your face," he says, "Of course, that was the whole point."

"I was...at a disadvantage. I shouldn't have drank the rakkale.." He shifts his feet and looks at the floor. The uneasiness is apparent in his voice. Over the past couple of years Axton has known him, Zero has only been this uncomfortable four times: once when Moxxi flirted with him relentlessly, twice when he's gotten hammered, and once when they kept trying to catch him eating or drinking; they had never actually seen him do either.

"There it is again. You didn't speak in Haiku when you were drunk either. Don't make it a habit," Axton jokes. "By the way you never did tell me how you broke Maya's phaselock."

"That, I will never tell." Zero starts to leave as Axton gathers up a towel and goes to take a shower. He calls after the assassin, "By the way! Since Maya was in on it too, that means you have to pay her back!"

There's a pause, then he hears, "Challenge accepted."

"Oh shit, this is gonna be good. I can't wait." Axton strips down and turns on the water, but just as soon as he steps into the shower, he hears it.

A bloodcurdling scream erupts from the apartment next door. Axton doesn't even think as he launches himself from the shower, snatches up his towel, and runs, dashing out of his apartment and down the hall to investigate. He certainly didn't expect it to happen this soon.

"What the..!? Aarrgh! Zero!" Maya screams.

"Damn, I'm in for it now." he reckons, while grinning to himself. The door is wide open and he walks in to see Zero just outside the bedroom. He's doubled over in laughter, which wouldn't be odd, if it wasn't so rare to see. Zero looks up and, upon seeing Axton, erupts into another laughing fit. He barely manages to jerk his thumb towards the bedroom.

The scene in Maya's room takes the commando completely by surprise. He steps in the doorway and asks, "What the hell is goin on in—" but he's cut off at the sight of a distraught Maya— blue hair in a sodden mess and naked except for a towel clutched to her torso— yelling and stomping that it's not funny, while Gaige just rolls around on the bed in hysterics. Another hologram stands facing the bathroom with its sword raised over it's head.

Axton can't believe it. Involuntary chuckles begin to escape and Maya notices him for the first time. His eyes glide up and down the length of her, noticing how the towel fails to cover her ample chest. In his mind he notes how her supple curves blend seamlessly with her leanness; how even with her hair in a mess and no makeup, her beauty is enough to make him melt.

The siren hurriedly covers herself as if her life depends on it. "Geez...Doesn't anyone ever knock..?" she says, pale cheeks flushing a deep red. That is when she REALLY notices him.

"W-Woah,...h-hey uh,..hey, ya A-Axton," she manages to stutter. Maya's eyes go big and her face blushes more intensely.

"Wow." Gaige is sitting up, wearing nothing but her underwear. Her eyes are now as big as Maya's. The look of pure surprise on both their face causes the gawking man to notice something. No one is laughing now except Zero who, at the moment, sounds like he's dying.

Both women are openly staring at him and he notices Maya's gaze is slowing looking him over and she bites her lip. "Ummm...You do know that...Yeah." Axton is standing in the doorway nude with a towel, except, the towel is hanging uselessly at his side. Unfortunately, the sight of the blue haired goddess in front of him has caused a slight hardness to take effect. "Ah, shit man, the towel!" The sudden realization of his current situation hits him like a brick wall; he whips the towel around to cover himself so fast that he nearly drops it. Now it's his turn to blush and stammer.

"So uh,...as I'm sure you both know, uh...Lilith wants us in briefing room," he can barely stammer out his lame excuse for being there. The usually stoic commando is beyond uncomfortable as he tries to find anywhere to look but her. "But I um,...heard a scream so I uh,...figured I would come and check you out," he clears his throat,"I mean check on you,..no, with you...no, I mean.." Axton quickly backs away. "You know what, I'm just gonna go." The newly embarrassed commando rushes out of the apartment, head spinning, before Maya can phaselock him.

Twenty minutes later he arrives at headquarters and bumps right into Patricia Tannis, who had refused to move her lab from the first floor after the upgrades to the building. The vial she is carrying shatters to the floor.

"Oh! Does anyone besides me have eyes?" She rolls her eyes before blushing at who it is. "J-just w-watch where you're going you b-big brute," with that, she turns on her heel and walks away quickly. "Great. Gaige has been talking." he sighs heavily at the thought. For all of Gaige's genius, she loved to gossip. If the crazy scientist knows about it and it hasn't even been half-an-hour yet then, by now, the mechromancer has told just about everyone. Axton liked the little redhead sure, she was like a little sister to him. And just like a sister, she could get on his nerves sometimes. "Wait, no, don't put it like that," He grimaces at the thought of someone he views as a sister having stared at his junk. "I mean she's cute, but...No man, just no." After a few minutes of mentally bracing himself, Axton's face settles into the emotionless stonewall that he's used to wearing and he walks up the stairs.

Maya sits on the dilapidated couch wishing she could be like Zero and turn invisible. Gaige had gotten to the briefing room a few minutes before her and, by the time Maya walked in, she could tell that everyone: Brick, Mordecai, Lilith, and even Krieg knew about this morning AND last night. Salvador, thankfully, was still at Moxxi's bar so he didn't know. "Gee, I can't wait till Salvador finds out," she sarcastically considers.

The memory of Axton standing naked in her bedroom, for some reason, wouldn't go away. Just the thought of it made her head spin and she couldn't think straight. The look on his face once he realized his situation was priceless, she had never seen him so nervous. Not even in battle. Thinking about that reminds her of how she feels now. Having Axton walk in and see her naked was one thing, but now she was surrounded by her snickering teammates.

There had been about five minutes of awkward silence after she had sat down in the briefing room. Everyone had kept casting looks and snickering at her, as she sat on the worn out couch. Eventually she couldn't take all of the idiotic smirks and glances directed at her anymore. "Jesus! What the hell is so funny?" she blurted. As soon as the question passed her lips she was bombarded with harassing jokes and questions. Most of them could be answered with a forced yes or no until Lilith, the leader of the Crimson Raiders, lost her professional composure and asked, "So, killer. Did ya enjoy the view?" She raised her eyebrow with a devilish smirk on her face. Maya just turned her head and blushed with embarrassment, which caused everyone to laugh; even Krieg was laughing, spinning around in a computer chair. She caught sight of Gaige at one of the computers and glared at her. Thankfully, Zero had disappeared to avoid questioning. His hologram stood in the corner with its arms crossed and a ':/' emote over the visor; she guessed that he didn't approve.

Maya is brought out of her thoughts by the sound of footsteps slowly coming up the stairs. "Oh, damn." Krieg starts to giggle loudly again until he catches a glare from Maya, which promptly makes him stop.

"Okay, we've all had our laughs now," Lilith says, "so don't say anything to Axton. We're supposed to be professional here." Her comment earns a snort from Mordecai. The redheaded siren shuts him up with an elbow to the ribs.

As Axton makes his way to the maproom from the the ajoining bunkroom, you can practically see the tension building in the room. Gaige's attention is fixated on him, she can't help but give him a once over herself; remembering how he looked this morning. She can see that he has the old military 'stonewall' expression on his face and mentally sighs with relief. "Good, he isn't going to fold under their crap," she hopes. He stalls at the briefing table and glances around the room as Brick makes his way to him. The siren groans.

"Heya' slab!" the big man booms; bringing a huge hand down on Axton's shoulder and nearly knocking him to the floor.

"Oof!" Axton takes a second to recover from the blow before replying, "Hey Brick how're you?" His face remains stoic while Brick barely holds a big grin back.

"Oh, I'm pretty good I guess. I'm just glad to see my favorite slab is finally here. What took so long? Have trouble this morning?" The giant tightens his grip on Axton, who is currently holding back his irritation, and smiles a big toothy grin. Lilith is currently laughing into her hand, apparently forgoing her words of professionalism.

"H-hey t-tough guy!" Lilith barely manages through suppressed giggling. Both Maya and Axton audibly sigh at her chortling. "H-hows it ha-hangin' today?" She can no longer hold it in and busts out laughing at her own question.

Maya watches as Axton's jaw tightens with annoyance. He manages in a calm yet forced voice, "No, no trouble this morning. Just got held up is all. I found Sal' at Moxxi's earlier, drunk again."

Mordecai, obviously a little drunk himself, laughs while standing by Lilith. "Yeah, I...I already told Lil' about that. Poor bastards still tore up about how his hometown got wiped out." He sobers up for a moment, then the grin creeps back. "What I wanna know amigo. Is why you didn't even need a rakkale or two before you were runnin' up to the girls all..." he finishes by making a running motion and flopping his forearm around in front of his pelvis. The act causes the room to, once again, die with laughter. "Oh my god. If I could just die of embarrassment." Maya mumbles. Mordecai's joke causes Axton's face to turn red with embarrassment.

The big beserker gently shoves Axton to the couch to sit as he turns to stand over the briefing map. Maya can't even look at the commando as he sits down, seemingly as far from her as he can. The awkwardness is palpable between them. Stealing a glance at him, she notices that he seems intent on staring straight ahead. Gaige giggles again from her computer and gets shot down with glares from both of them. Zero walks in, looks around the room, and shakes his head before taking the hologram's place in the corner by the door.

A three-dimensional holo-map rises from the mission briefing table and everyone looks at Lilith expectantly. It's a map of the Highlands with Sanctuary's modern day location marked over the cliffs in the northeastern corner, Haven just below. Other Raider strong-points and towns are marked all over the Highlands. The last Hyperion stronghold's being Opportunity and the Wildlife Exploitation Preserve.

Lilith selects the WEP location with her finger and a map of it replaces the Highlands. Maya has been through the place a few times herself; it always has very heavy security. A bout of curiosity enters her mind as she wonders if they were going to go ahead and take it out like Lilith always mentions. Big monitors positioned over the map on the briefing table flickered on to show surveillance footage of the Preserve.

The monitors are a reminder of how much new equipment they had gotten over the years. For instance, all the old monitors were sold off and replaced by re-purposed screens from a Hyperion outpost. These new screens are more advanced and designed specifically for analyzing surveillance footage. What's on screen could easily be transferred to the briefing table to be manipulated in holographic format.

Maya remembers when the table had been upgraded by Gaige so that all holograms could be easily manipulated from a set of on-screen controls and also by hand. It took everyone forever to stop talking about how awesome the improvements were. Once or twice, they caught Gaige and Zero playing some shooter games which, much to his frustration, Zero would always lose. The other change was to the computers behind the table which had also been replaced and upgraded—looted from Hyperion facilities—much to Gaige's satisfaction.

"I guess Hyperion is good for something after all," she thinks.

With a swipe of her finger, Lilith pulls a surveillance feed down from one of the monitors—turning it into a hologram. It depicts several advanced looking Hyperion loaders making the rounds at the main gate.

"Now that we've all had our laugh at these two's expense," she motions towards Axton and Maya, "We can get on with our briefing." "As you can see Hyperion has increased their presence at the Wildlife Exploitation Preserve. Part of the new defenses at the site included some of these guys." Lilith spreads her hands over the video, causing one of the to loaders freeze and enlarge to stand three feet tall over the table.

"I'll never get used to that," Mordecai says.

"Yeah, well good thing I'm Awesome! Otherwise we wouldn't have any of this sweet tech," Gaige compliments herself.

Lilith smirks at her comment. "These loaders are more badass than the ones we've seen before. They combine the traits of three different loaders into one."

"Ha! They don't look like nothin' I can't crush." Brick points out.

"Maybe, but you might want a gun for this mission, Brick." She swipes her hand across and some stats appear next to it. "From what I've gathered they have: a belt-fed spinigun with an extreme rate of fire; a projectile deflecting prop on the right hand, and an multi-barrel belt-fed rpg that's mounted on the right shoulder." She manipulated the image and the armaments separated, listing stats.

"Looks like some pretty heavy damage shit." Axton says. He points to its back, "I take it that hardened case on the back is where the ammo is stored," he points out.

The mechromancer chimes in, "Yes. I've done some digging in Hyperion's data network and apparently they're just big ammunition storage decks. They can digistruct enough ammo so that they don't have to stop firing until those guns overheat. It's a lot like your turret." She pulls out a touchpad and uses it to zoom in on the case. "The whole loader has heavily upgraded armor, but the storage deck is its weak spot." Smiling to herself she adds, "Also, hitting the loaders with enough elemental shock damage should short out their ammunition supply for a second or two. Once we get in there and start to fight them I'll be able to provide more intel.

"Good. I'll have to do a quick mod to my turret before we go."

"If that's not enough, my phaselock should take care of them," Maya says.

The hologram of the loader dissipates. "Those loaders aren't the only problem though." Lilith pulls up footage of a new type of Hyperion personnel. "These badasses are like an upgraded combat engineer. They have a stronger exo-suit and are dressed in armor that is similar to a soldier's, but stronger." The hologram of one of the soldier-engineers enlarged and they could see the exosuit was more form-fitting and was combined with large contoured armor plating. "We'll have to keep an eye on these bastards. They're faster, jumpier, and slightly smarter than your average Hyperion jackass."

"Good thing you've got me and Deathtrap to even the odds then." Gaige is bouncing in her seat, eager to finally do something in the field.

"I'll grind their bones for the blood feast!" yells Krieg. "Arrgh. Sorry. Need to kill yellow meat-bags."

Lilith just brings up the map, shaking her head. "Sorry to say Krieg but you won't be going on this trip. Neither will you," she points at Gaige. Irritated whines can be heard from both of them. "I need you, Gaige, to stay here at headquarters and keep everyone updated with some real-time intel."

The redhead huffs disappointedly. "You mean that I have to stay back here and play ECHO girl AGAIN?"

Axton snorts a laugh and Maya smiles to herself at the comment. The wink she receives from Lilith tells her that it's not just a matter of convenience to have Gaige stay behind. "Thank you Lil'. Thank you!" she thinks.

"Yes. You'll get to go out next time I promise, but right now I need your help to provide tactical support. Which leads me to you, Krieg. You will be helping with the defense of Overlook. I got a report that a bunch of Hyperion goons are going to try to take it back from us. I'll have to brief you about that later."

"Ahaha! I'll put my pain in their souls."

They all start to laugh and Lilith clears her throat. "So, now. If we can wrap this up.." Everyone's eyes move to her. "Mordecai and I have decided that it is best to not only knock Hyperion out of the Preserve, but take it for ourselves. It will become the secondary Crimson Raiders headquarters and double as a research facility."

"What would we want with a research facility?" Brick asks.

"A lot of things actually. I've already told Tannis that she'll have a lab of her own once we get everything fixed up."

Mordecai laughs. "Yeah and, for a second, she was so hyped up about it that she forgot about her ceiling chairs. Think of it this way amigo. If we pull this off, get the animals released, get everything fixed up, and get some of those ex-Hyperion guys out there—we could actually design and make our own shit. We might even make our own weapons."

Brick looks from one friend to the other before saying, "Hell yeah, count me in. So what's the plan?"

"The plan is pretty straightforward. Everyone except Krieg, Gaige, Sal', and myself will be in on it. There will be explosions, expert maneuvers and plenty of shooting. So everyone pay attention. This is how it's all going to go down..."