One wrestled with the buzzard control stick, aiming the unstable craft towards the training ground below. As long as he got close enough, he could jump out and land safely, he just had to coax the craft over the forcefield wall...

[Light him up, Hunters!]

One looked up sharply at the sound of the intercepted ECHO transmission. His lifeform sensors registered at least half a dozen biosigns near the main entrance to the facility, each with-

He used the space of a heartbeat to enter a short command sequence on his wrist controls, then leapt off the buzzard, a half second before the Vault Hunter's rockets blasted it into fiery oblivion.

As he fell, One deactivated his human style speech processor and activated a high frequency transmitter in his helmet. Only one other person would be able to communicate with him this way. Come, brother. Now we end this.

Zero cast aside his rocket launcher and scanned the wreckage. His helmet illuminated a figure falling to the ground and projected its landing point. Zero drew his sword and sprinted towards it. Yes. We do.

"He's down, Tannis!" Axton yelled into his ECHO. "Zero's moving to take him out now! How's it going in there?"

[I have secured the system. He shouldn't be able to use the mountain against us now.]

"Glad to hear it." He looked at Lilith. "How about it, Lil?"

Lilith had been staring intently at the sleek, black ship parked on a mesa top. Now she broke her gaze away from it and shook her head. "It's no good. Tina didn't do enough damage to the shields; I can't teleport through them."

"So we're one for two," Mordecai said grimly. "At least we won't have to deal with-"

"Heads up!" Salvador shouted, scooping up and gesturing with Zero's abandoned launcher. "We've got incoming!" All over Digistruct Peak, the small pods that manifested enemies were flaring to life.

Mordecai sighed and drew his gun. "Never mind."

Axton cursed and pulled his rifle. "What's going on in there?! It looks like he just activated the whole freakin' mountain!"

[It seems he anticipated my primary shutdown routines, but not to worry,] Tannis' prim voice replied. [I am attempting to circumvent his controls and deactivate the projectors. In the meantime, I have already taken steps to mitigate the ever so rude seizing of my facility. All the doors are sealed, and the energy fields are at full strength.]

The slow, steady drone of Digistruct Peak's energy field began to die, accompanied by a cacophony of loud, resounding clanks as the doors simultaneously unlocked.

[Oh dear.]

"Load 'em up, Hunters!" Axton roared. "God only knows what he's gonna-"

"Axton, wait." Maya grabbed his arm. "Something's wrong. Look at the pods."

Axton squinted down across the training ground, looking for the source of her worry. "What? Nothing's even spawned yet."

"Exactly," she pointed out. "By now there should be at least a dozen enemies on the field."

"So why aren't there," Axton finished, keying his ECHO. "Are you guys seeing anything weird in there?"

[You'd better believe it, sugar,] Moxxi's voice came back. [He's up to something out there. Even with all the pods running at once, the system is pulling more power than it should.]

"Then what is going on?" Maya stared out at the pods. "What could he possibly..." Her voice trailed off as a shadow fell across the mountain.

With a sort of reluctant dread, the Vault Hunters looked straight up... and found a rakk with a wingspan the size of Sanctuary resolving into existence.

"Oh, you have to got to be f-"

The rakk crashed its wings against the air, creating a downdraft powerful enough to stagger all the Hunters. The creature rocketed skyward, its wails echoing in the canyon around them.

[Oh my. It looks like he accessed my level nine projects. How interesting.]

"Dammit, Tannis!" Axton tracked the soaring creature and fired his assault rifle, but the rakk simply ignored the bullets. "When we get out of this, I am personally dismantling this whole freakin' place!"

"Keep cool, hermano! We got this!" Salvador unleashed a barrage of rockets at the circling rakk. The missiles tracked, exploded against its hide... and left the rakk undamaged.

It was, however, pissed.

Salvador dove for cover as the rakk swooped overhead, the wind from its passage ripping at his clothes. It pulled a sharp turn, ignoring everything else and coming right back at Salvador. A cavernous maw began to open-

Maya's eyes widened. "COVER YOUR EARS!"

A sonic wave blasted out, shattering rock and blowing a crater a foot deep into the ground. The rakk flapped its wings and soared past, circling menacingly.

Maya crawled over to where Salvador lay, facedown and unmoving. She rolled him over and pulled open an eye. "Sal! Sal, you okay?!"

Salvador's eye tracked blearily. "Anybody get the number of that moon?"

"Hang on." Maya's tattoos flared, and she started healing Salvador's wounds. "I can get him back up in a minute."

"Won't do us any good if we can't kill that thing," Axton growled. "Tannis! Moxxi! Can you shut down the system, de-digistruct that thing?!"

[We're trying!] Moxxi said tensely. [When he hacked the system, he changed all the access codes at the same time! We have to go through all the system backdoors and reset everything the slow way!]

"What about cutting the power?!" Mordecai yelled. "Can't we just pull the plug?"

[He locked us out of the power systems, too! Everything needs to be reset!]

Axton ducked as the rakk swooped by again, but at least it didn't shoot another sonic blast at them. "How long will that take?!"

[An hour if we're lucky!]

A blast from the rakk sent shattered a building and sent debris flying across the training ground. "Work faster!" Axton signed off.

"We can't wait for them, we'll get shredded!"Lilith shouted over the gale force winds. "We've gotta take that thing out!"

Mordecai fired a salvo of sniper shots that bounced harmlessly off the rakk's hide. "If you've got any ideas, Lil, I'm sure we'd all love to hear 'em!"

"I might have a really bad one!" She grabbed Maya by the shoulder. "Do you think you can take control of that thing?"

Maya stared at her. "Can I Thoughtlock a digistruct creature with a brain the size of a train car?!" She looked at the circling rakk, then back at Salvador. "Not from down here, and not while I'm patching him up."

"What about from on the rakk?" Lilith demanded. "Could you take control if you were in physical contact?"

"How would I know?!" Maya exploded. "I've never tried to take something that size! Besides, how am I supposed to..." She trailed off and looked at Lilith, taking particular note of the other Siren's now glowing tattoos. "Oh. Right. Teleporter. But Sal's still-"

"Go, chica."

Maya looked down to see Salvador struggling to sit up. "Sal, wait-!"

"You wait any longer, we're all dead!" he growled, grabbing his launchers again. "Go and try this! It could be our only shot!" He grinned. "Trust me, riding around on the back of a giant critter you're about to kill is awesome."

Maya stared at the crazy, filthy dwarf circumstances had brought into her life and gave him a quick hug. "You're irrepressible, you know that?" She grinned. "And a hell of a lot of fun."

"When you get back, you can explain the first part to me!" Salvador raised his launchers. "We'll draw him in! Get ready to jump, Lil!"

Lilith nodded. "Put your arm over my shoulder, Maya. This'll be easier if we're actually touching."

"Right." Maya threw her left arm over Lilith's shoulder and pulled her SMG. "Anything else I can do?"

"Just start running when I do," Lilith said tightly. "And keep shooting once we're up there!" she shouted at the guys. "It's big enough that you probably won't hit us, and we really don't want this thing to get to wise the fact we're running around on him! Ready?!"

Five hunters wielding six launchers took aim. Krieg tossed a thumbs-up in Maya's direction. "You powdered your cockatiel for the ribcage slaughter!"

Maya grinned. "FIRE!"

The rockets streaked across the sky and slammed into the rakk, drawing its attention once more. It wheeled around, soaring towards them like a living thunderstorm, until...

"NOW!"

Lilith and Maya sprinted forward. Lilith's tattoo's glowed, spreading into her eyes, across her arm, into Maya's body, and with a brilliant flash-

the two women tumbled out of the air, landing on hard, rubbery, and very unstable rakk flesh.

Maya staggered and dropped to one knee, but Lilith's teleport had put them more or less at the center of the creature's back. "At least we won't fall off!" Maya shouted. The wind from the creature's flight was even worse than the downdraft. "Nice landing sp- are you alright?!"

Lilith was noticeably pale, and a lot of her weight was hanging on Maya for support. "I'm...fine," she managed. "I've just never done that before."

"You teleported a city!"

"While hopped up on Eridium!" Lilith shot back. "This one was cold turkey!" She pulled free of Maya's grasp. "Do it! Phaselock this thing!"

Maya pushed away her doubts and closed her eyes, focusing. She could feel the rakk's mind, the constructed lifeform's 'instincts', but... "It's no good!" she yelled. "I still can't break in! Not unless-" she opened her eyes. "I need to get to the head!"

As the rakk beat its wings, Lilith saw it was swinging around to take another run at their friends below. "Better get there fast!"

"I am so sick of giant monsters!" Axton roared. "Terramorphous, Voracidous, Mongzilla, the freakin' Warrior, and now this rakk thing?!" He fired another ineffective burst at the circling monstrosity. "I'd rather be facing the hordes of Digistruct Peak! Alone! With a spoon!"

"Shoulda been there for Varmothra!" Salvador shouted back. He had dropped his rocket launcher and switched to dual miniguns. "He was fun! And we were in the air that time!"

"Oh yeah, a bullet-proof, flame spewing, grenade launching mega-varkid! He's all yours every time, Sal!" Axton reached to his ECHO and felt his turret deck resolve into his hand, pulled it back to throw... and stopped. He stared at the turret platform like he'd never seen it before. "Oh, man, would that work?"

Krieg stared in disbelief as Axton suddenly turned and sprinted away from them. "He wore a yellow ribbon?!"

"I need to check something!" Axton shouted back. "Just give me a second!"

Axton sprinted to the control center for the Peak and practically broke down the door getting in. Moxxi spun away from the control panel she was working on and frowned in confusion at him. "Shouldn't you be out there, trying to kill that thing?"

"Tannis!" Axton half-gasped, half-shouted. "Idea! Circuits!"

Tannis barely spared him a glance before returning to her work. "Really, if you're not going to make sense, don't try and distract us," Tannis sniffed, typing furiously on a keyboard. "We have enough to worry about right now."

"And I think I can help with that!" Axton slammed his turret deck down next to her. "My turret has a Hecker circuit reintegrator. What can you do with that?"

"That infernal piece of technology!" Tannis exploded. "Completely unreliable, highly temperamental, and totally unworthy of the praise it receives from the fringe! Not mention that the system is active right now!"

"And what would happen if you put this highly untrustworthy piece of tech into an active system?" Axton prodded.

Moxxi stopped her work and turned, listening intently.

"At best, it would disrupt the focusing arrays of the Digistruct pods, destabilizing the construct and rendering it highly vulnerable," Tannis sniffed. "At worst, the entire construct could explode!"

Axton and Moxxi glanced at each other, then sprang into action. "I'll need a minute to get the deck open-"

"That's okay, sugar, I need a minute to find the right line to insert the device-"

Tannis watched them in befuddlement for a second, then the light dawned. "Oh." She moved over to Axton's side. "Make sure you disconnect the power source in your turret first, you don't want to shock yourself."

Axton spared her half a grin and keyed his ECHO. "Hang on guys! We're working on something new!"

A sonic blast rocked the building, and the sound of gunfire resounded over the ECHO channel. [Make it fast!]

"Hey, Lilith!" Maya yelled. "What am I supposed to do with this thing once I've seized control?! You never told me that part of your crazy plan!"

"Find some way to turn it to our advantage!" Lilith shouted over the wind. "And I think we're on your crazy part now!"

Running up the rakk had proved impossible. Between a thirty mile an hour headwind and the constant undulations of the creature beneath them, crawling to its head was turning out to be the only way forward.

Maya pulled herself forward another few feet, and as she put her hand back in contact with the rakk's head, she felt something resonate deep in her mind. "Here!" she shouted. "We've reached it's brain!"

"Okay! Get ready!" Lilith's tattoos flared, and power coursed along her arms. "I've never tried this before!" she warned. "I don't know how long I'll be able to hold it!"

"That makes two of us!" Maya yelled back. "Let's do this fast!"

Lilith nodded and focused her power. The energy in her hands formed a small sphere, pulsing with light. Lilith pressed the energy into the rakk's head, grabbed the edges with her mind, and, with a cry of effort, pulled.

The sphere widened into a portal, and suddenly Maya was staring at the rakk's exposed brain.

"Hurry!" Lilith's voice was strained to breaking.

Maya's tattoos flashed, and she stabbed her arm into the rakk's brain, burying it up to the elbow. The body of the creature shuddered, the wings hesitated, and for a second, everything went silent. Then...

"I've got it!" Maya yelled. She noticed something out of the corner of her eye... "And I think I know what to do with it!" The light on her arm pulsed, and the rakk began to turn towards the black ship, still guarded by its energy field.

"Maaaya..." Lilith's grip was weakening. "I... can't hold this much longer..."

"You've got to!" Maya shouted. "I just need to get us aimed!" The rakk's head was coming into line with the ship.

The portal's edges were four inches from Maya's arm and closing.

"Ok, here we go..." Maya whispered. "Shriek!"

The rakk's devastating sonic blast slammed into the energy field. The shields flickered wildly, trying to stabilize themselves.

"Oh, no you do not!"

The rakk blasted again, twice, three more times. With each shriek, the shields grew more and more unstable, until, with one final blast, the field shattered like glass, the energy scattering and dissipating into nothingness.

"They're down!"

"Get clear!" Lilith yelled, her voice agonized.

Maya yanked her arm free of the rakk's brain just as Lilith's portal collapsed. She examined the fluid covering her arm with distaste. "Simulated or not, this is just nasty."

"At least... you've still got it," Lilith gasped. "A second slower and my portal would've cut it off." She tried to stand and fell into a half-sitting, half-collapsed position.

"Are you alright?" Maya asked, worried. "That looks like it took everything you had."

"I've got enough left to get us into that ship," Lilith said grimly. "Let's go get Gaige."

"One thing first." Maya switched on her ECHO. "Guys, I've lost control of the rakk, but we got the shields down! We're making a run for Gaige!"

[Go for it, chica! Axton's working on something down here! If it pays off, it'll take care of Rodakk for us!]

"Got it!" Maya switched off. "You heard him, Lil! Let's get outta here!" She looped her arm under Lilith's and pulled her up. "It looks like there's a door! Aim for that!"

Lilith didn't answer. She just clenched her jaw and focused her eyes on the open hatch, straining with all her mind and will. Almost reluctantly, the air filled with purple energy, building steadily in brightness until there was a brilliant flash-

The ground under Maya's feet was stable again. And it was metal. "You did it!"

"I'm so... glad..." Lilith's legs sagged as she lapsed into unconsciousness.

"Lilith!" Maya caught her partner's weight and eased her to the deck. "Lilith, can you hear me?" Maya checked her over with growing concern. Lilith's skin was clammy, her breathing shallow and rapid. "I don't understand this, what is going-"

"Uhhhh..."

For a second, Maya thought Lilith was waking up, but the other Siren was still unconscious. Half expecting an attack, Maya panned her gun around the room, looking for the source of the moan. The room didn't offer much cover. It looked like some kind of workshop with an empty table in the center. On the floor near the end of the table, Maya caught a glimpse of a shock of red hair- "Gaige!"

Gaige was lying on the ground a little ways back from the table, a strange metal device on her head. Maya checked to make sure Lilith was still breathing, then moved to her other friend. She pulled Gaige into a sitting position and removed the metal headgear. "Gaige, are you alright? Can you hear me?"

"Uh... yeah, yeah, I'm awake, Mom..." Gaige's eyes fluttered open and focused on Maya's face. "Maya!" She clamped her arms around Maya's neck. "Oh, I'm so glad you're here! Thanks for ignoring my message and coming after-" she broke off and looked at the door. "One! Did you get him?! Last I saw he was crashing in a buzzard!"

"Easy, easy," Maya soothed. "Zero's fighting- did you call him One ?"

"It's what he calls himself," Gaige said, pushing herself up. "He kidnapped me to-" she caught sight of Lilith. "Lilith!" Gaige dropped next to the prone Siren. "Who did this?!"

"I think she did it to herself," Maya admitted. "We had to do some weird stuff with our powers, and for some reason it really tapped her out. Maybe it has something to do with what she went through with Jack, but I'm not sure." She eyed Gaige's robotic arm. "Can you summon Deathtrap? Get him to carry her down?"

"I've got a better idea," Gaige said. "Help me carry her forward. One has some medical equipment on board we might be able to use."

Maya hesitated. "Are you sure that's safe?" she asked. "We'd be using a known enemy's equipment. How do we know he doesn't have it rigged?"

"He used it on me," Gaige pointed out. "Besides, can you heal her faster than a state-of-the-art piece of medical equipment?"

"No," Maya finally admitted. "You grab her feet, I'll take her shoulders. Which way are we going?"

"Through the door on the right and all the way back," Gaige instructed, picking up Lilith's feet. "You said everyone is here?"

"Yes," Maya confirmed. "Zero's fighting his brother, but he used the projectors to create a giant rakk. Everyone else is trying to take care of that." Maya frowned as she saw Gaige's cut-up right forearm. "Are you sure you're alright? He didn't hurt you?"

"What, this?" Gaige jerked her head at the cuts. "It's nothing that won't heal on its own. Here, open that door behind you."

They had reached the end of the short hallway. Maya pressed a few switches on a keypad, and the door slid open, revealing the medical chamber Gaige had woken up in. "Here we go," Gaige said, laying down Lilith's feet and checking the console. "Umm... it's good, the system's in standby." She entered a few commands, and the lid swung open with the hiss of hydraulics. "Just put her in and it'll do a scan, then recommend a treatment option."

"Good," Maya said, easing Lilith into the chamber. "Once she's set, let's see if we can find the cockpit. If there's any chance we can get this ship flying, maybe we can use it to our advantage." She smiled a little. "Too bad Tina's not in here."

"Tina?" Gaige gave her a puzzled look while typing on the medical chamber's keypad. "Why would Tina- ha!" The chamber sealed itself and began to run a diagnostic on Lilith. "Here we go. With any luck, the computer can tell us..." she trailed off as the results began to appear on the screen. "Uh...Maya? Can you read this and make sure I'm not crazy?"

Maya frowned. "Why?" she asked, moving around to Gaige's side. "Too technical or..." she trailed off. "No way."

Salvador whistled appreciatively as the rakk blasted at the ship's defensive fields, hammering the energy barrier with sonic force. "Maya's actually controlling that thing? Senorita's got some real chops."

"There go the shields!" Mordecai shouted, pointing. The barrier flickered, pulsed, and shattered, leaving the ship exposed.

Maya's voice crackled over the ECHO. [Guys, I've lost control of the rakk, but we got the shields down! We're making a run for Gaige!]

"Go for it, chica!" Salvador yelled. "Axton's working on something down here! If it pays off, it'll take care of Rodakk for us!"

[Got it!] The line went dead.

Kreig looked at Salvador, puzzlement in his visible eye. "Rodakk?"

Salvador shrugged. "What, doesn't a big guy like that deserve a nickname?"

"Whatever you wanna call him, he's coming back!" Mordecai warned. "Get ready to-"

The rakk shrieked again, and the blast sent Mordecai flying. Salvador fired off a salvo of rockets, but the rakk seemed to have learned from past experiences. It shrieked again, targeting the rockets themselves. The projectiles exploded harmlessly, and the rakk unleashed a rapid salvo of blasts at the hunters below.

Salvador was thrown off his feet and crashed into a wall. Krieg managed to dodge the first wave, but was caught in the trailing edge of the second, then slammed by the full force of the third. The rakk circled, wailing in fury and challenge.

"Uhhhh..." Salvador pushed himself up, wiped blood out of his eye, and keyed his ECHO. "Ax... I think it's angry again... how we doin' in there?"

"Hang on!" Axton turned over to Moxxi. "How close are we?!"

"I've managed to get power cut off from the main lines!" Moxxi started pulling a panel off one of the control computers. "We need to install the circuit in here, on the card labeled AA-214. Once it's in, I'll reactivate the mains, and, with any luck..."

"The big guy out there dies," Axton finished, peering into the computer. A thousand blinking light stared back at him. "Which one is it?!"

"Allow me," Tannis said, sliding up. "I installed this entire system, I remember each and every... here we are!" She deftly removed one of the cards. "Now, let me see your reintegrator."

Axton sighed, but handed the small, oddly shaped device over. "Is this going to fry the chip? I know this was my idea, but I'd hate to go down to one turret."

A rapid salvo of sonic blasts rattled the building again, sending part of the ceiling crashing to the floor.

"Never mind, just DO it!"

Tannis pulled out a small pair of cutting pliers, and delicately snipped out the connections for an existing chip on the board. Just as quickly, she slipped the Hecker circuit on to the board, and with an equally delicate series of actions, twisted the remaining contacts around the new chip. "Ah, how nostalgic! I haven't had to do an on the fly field realignment since-"

"Just PUT IT IN!" Moxxi yelled.

"Well!" Tannis sniffed haughtily, but she slid the modified card back into its slot. "Installation complete. You may return power to this line."

Axton scrambled for the control board. "Choke on this, skagsucker," he growled.

Click.

Salvador turned one hazy eye towards the circling rakk. He didn't think he could move fast enough to dodge its blast this time. He watched as the creature opened its mouth-

But instead of a lethal sonic wave, only a sort of awkward, confused squawk emerged, harmless and directionless. The rakk's body twisted in midair, and the energy tracing over its body scattered like static in a bad communication.

"He... did it!" Salvador crowed, dragging himself up. "Mordy, Krieg, get up! We've got our chance!"

The three dazed, staggered fighters hauled themselves upright one more time. "Give it everything you've got," Mordecai said grimly. "We're not gettin' another shot at this one!"

"Just watch me bring the party!" Salvador bellowed.

"Their cruisers can't repel firepower of THIS magnitude!" Krieg roared.

One final burst of rockets streaked towards the crippled rakk, targeted dead center of its warped, disrupted body. The rockets exploded against its skin, and this time, sent chunks of digistructed flesh raining down across the mountain. The rakk wailed in agony and started to fall, the colossal wings halting mid-flap. It plummeted for half a second, then, in a blaze of light and sound-

detonated.

[It's a little like playing spot the difference.]

[Next week, the brothers duel. As ever, thanks for reading.]