Pt.6 Downtime

"A what?" Maya asked, not sure if she heard right.

"A little, girl's night. Y'know. You, me, Lilith, Tannis...just kind of. Kick back. After Salvador broke that one guy's arm, buisness has been a little slow. And with everything that's happened, I think we all deserve this." Moxxi said with a smile, washing out a few glasses.

It was true though, in just the past few months the vault hunters had taken on Hyperion, slayed the Warrior, murdered Handsome Jack, lost Roland then got him back--which he insist remains a secret to only himself, gained two new hunters, nearly got killed by one of them, sent that one to exile, yeah, it was a lot to take in. The siren sighed as she ran the information through her head then rested her chin in her palm.

"Yeah, I guess that would be nice." She smiled slightly.

"Great! Go round up th--"

"FUCK. EVERYTHING. I AM SO DONE!" A teenage voice raged with a loud metallic THUNK as her prosthetic arm fell to the floor. The two other women looked at the mechromancer quizzically.

"What happened to you?" Maya asked, raising a brow.

"Alright." Gaige huffed, taking a seat, "So I get this request right? Go out to the Highlands, take care of a few straggling bots, roll in the cash flo'...you get it. WEEEEELLL! Seems like Thrashers like metal compositions, because one minute I'm firing and takin' them on like the total badass I am, then the next one of those tentacle beasties have their little tendrils around my arm. AAAAaaaand POP! Off it goes, I'm screamin' like a midget psycho, trying to kill all these douche-canoes without DT with me. Luckily I got rid of them. But I couldn't just return home without no dough! Sooooo I kinda, popped my arm back into place, took out those Loaders, and boom, here I am." She raised her arm above her head, "Now if you'll excuuuse me, I have an arm to fix."

"Wait Gaige," Moxxi chucked, "Seems like you need a night off too."

The 16-year-old's eyes lit with excitement, "Hell to the yeeaaaaah! Like a girl's night?! Man I haven't gone to one in aaaaaaaaaages." A few mechanical parts fell from her shoulder, "Arm....right." And with that she dashed off, a little bit of a spring in her step.

"Yep. We definitely need this." Maya smiled wider, sliding off her seat.
--- --- --- --- ---
"Dirt...more dirt...what's that over there?" The Psycho whipped his head to his left," More...dirt." The inner Krieg sighed. They had been wandering the Arid Badlands for days, the food and water now dangerously low thanks to the Psycho's ravenous eating habits. The outer Krieg let out an audible groan before falling into the sand face first. He waved his arms around in the grainy terrain, leaving grooves in the shape of some demented sand-angel. If there was anything these two could be in sync on, it was that they were exhausted, bored, and alone. The exile had most likely slaughtered every skag and rakk in the vicinity.

"I don't know about you...But we've gotta do something fast..."

"SHRED THE SAND! BREAK THE SKY!"

"What?"The inner voice paused and metaphorically shook his head, trying to rid himself of that outburst,"Okay...well, first things first. Shelter. These last few days have been hell sleeping on sand."

The psycho pushed himself off the sand and began to meander in no particular direction, occasionally plucking at the wraps around his wrists.

"We've done this before, remember? Before we met her."

The outer Krieg looked around lazily, obviously beginning to lose his focus from exhaustion. On the horizon he saw the silhouette of a tattered flag fluttering in the breeze. His eyes narrowed, like a cat about to chase a toy. Krieg stopped in his tracks and slightly ran in place, a small excited smile emerging under his mask.

"Yeah, go chase that. Flags mean bases, bases mean shelter. Hell, we can probably steal whatever those bandits have."

"AHAHAHAH! READY OR NOT! HERE I CooOOoooME~" The Psycho cackled, chasing that flag over the horizon.

--- --- --- --- ---
"Ohhhh my god I needed this." Lilith sighed contently as she sprawled out on the couch in the back room of Moxxi's Bar.

"No shit right?" Gaige chuckled as she made some finishing adjustments to her robotic limb.

"I concur, besides, this could be helpful towards my research." Tannis mumbled the last part of her thought.

Maya found herself a seat next to her fellow Siren and slumped over the arm of the couch, letting out a sigh and staring at the wall. The other four women looked at the blue-haired female worriedly. Gaige looked up at Lilith, as if to ask "The hell's up with her?", but Lilith only shrugged. Moxxi smiled smugly, knowing exactly what was going through the Siren's head, but then coughed loudly to break her smug expression and call the attention of the others.

"Well, here's to all the chaos and madness that's gone through this past year!" She said cheerfully, the other gave small expressions of cheer.

Lilith laughed, causing everyone to turn their heads at her.

"What's so funny?" The scientist asked.

"N-nothing, just...thinking about what the guys must be doing right now." The Firehawk confessed.

Everyone raised a brow.

"I told Roland I was headed here for some down time with you all, and one of the guys must have overheard me because not even two seconds later Salvador comes running up the steps and spouting off about how he and his 'Amigos' are gonna start some kind of 'Rakk Fighting Ring'. So just picture all of them sending Rakks after each other and taking bets."

There was a silence before a loud laughter erupted amongst the women.

"AHAH! I bet they threw some midgets into the mix!" Gaige cackled.

Hours passed filled with unimportant gossip, chatter, and complaints about nothing in particular, but as the night became the early hours of the morning...

"Soooo Maya, how're you doin' without your Psycho?" Moxxi asked with a smirk. The nearly-asleep Siren's eyes shot wide open and focused on the top hat-wearing woman.

"What do you mean by that?" She yawned.

"Like, are you thinking of just going out there and finding him? Or are you just going to move on?"

Tannis pulled out a pen and paper, ready to jot down what Maya was about to say. The Siren's gaze grew distant, what was she going to do? Roland purposefully didn't tell her where they were sending Krieg, knowing she would most likely go after him. So going out with no knowledge was near suicide, but a constant tugging in her chest wouldn't let her forget about him.

"A miracle. That's what." She muttered, clenching her fist.

There was a collective "what" that broke the Siren's trance.

"I mean, think about it. We took down Hyperion, slayed the Warrior, killed Handsome Jack, lost our leader then miraculously got him back, if this hasn't been a year of miracles or at least dumb luck, I don't know what is. A part of me wants to go out there and find him, but a larger part is just telling me to wait..." Maya declared, everyone else once again exchanged glances.
--- --- --- --- ---
"...Fyrestone...Not a bandit hideout, just Fyrestone..."

Krieg tossed the remaining pieces of a JNK-Loader in a pile with the others he had just killed, grunting contently. The tattered flag he had chased was one from the ruins of Fyrestone. The Psycho had set himself up in a slightly-collapsed hut, but not without marking it to show it was his. He had taken some oil from a demolished Loader and crudely finger-painted out "KRiEgS" on the outer wall by the entrance, and an even more crude "PiS Off" under it.

"Classy..." The inner Krieg sighed. A dim blue light caught his attention, a power core. The exile carefully took the core that was rolling slowly past him. The faint blue glow was comforting for some reason, he brought the light source closer to his face, smiling at the inviting light.

"Pretty...Blue...." He grunted, "Blue...beauty."

The hulking man slumped to the ground and cautiously held the power core to his chest. Heat radiated from the cylinder, enveloping Krieg in a soothing warmth. For the first time since that incident, he didn't feel alone. His throat tightened and his head ached. This isolation was going to kill him.

"Need..." Kreig huffed in what sounded like a growl.

"What? Woah there. Let's back it up."

"Prove...gotta....prove it to...them...her..." There was a silence inside of the Psycho's mind, one of shock and awe.

"Yeah yeah! That's right. We gotta---"

"OUT OF MY HEAD! OUT OUT!" Krieg swatted his palm against his skull as if he was trying to shake excess water from his ear.

"We're getting there. We can do this."

"SHOW THEM ALL THE DOOOOOOM!" The vault hunter bellowed, leaping up. 

There was another internal silence, "Yeah. Show them."

--- --- --- --- ---
"So uh...How did Roland come back. I mean, since you two are so close and all...I thought you would know." The Mechromancer asked Lilith who was now sprawled out on the couch.

"Because miracles do exist." A baritone voice caught the attention of the sleepy crowd. Roland stood in the door, looking rather exhausted himself.

"Roland when...what...I thought you were out with the guys!" Lilith exclaimed rolling over quickly.

The head Raider chucked and rubbed the back of his head,"One can only take so many midget brawls, skag fights, and whatever else pops into those three's heads." A soft snickering filled the air, "Anyways...It's about time you all knew, I'll explain it to the others when they aren't punting Varkid pods."

Everyone scooted closer to their leader whom took a seat on a stool.

"When I got shot, everything still got sent into the New-U system, but with Angel dead, it had no where to go. It was a lot of nothingness and black. But then there was this pulse--I suppose it was the Vault key being used--and I heard Angel...She could have saved herself, but no, she saved me. Granted, it took a hell of a lot longer then I had liked. But I doubt another miracle like that will ever happen again." Roland explained, a deep respect in his tone.

"So why did you keep it a secret?" Tannis asked, eager to know more.

"Because for a while, it didn't feel real...It felt like a nightmare and a dream at the same time. I came to terms with it a while ago, but it only seemed best to tell when everything finally settled down."

There was a collective "ohhh" before the room fell silent again. Everyone awkwardly shuffled around.

"So...yeah, have fun with your downtime ladies." The commander bid the others a farewell before heading out.

Another silence, that new bit of information was reassuring and unsettling at the same time. Most of the time on Pandora, if it could go wrong, it would and get one hundred times worse. It was rare that such a good thing would happen, even if it happened a while ago. One by one the women fell asleep, letting all that lost rest time finally catch up.

--- --- --- --- ---

Krieg had set himself on a new mission, one that did not require him to wipe out half the beast population in the Badlands--though it was a nice little bonus--he began a search for anything that glowed, from power cores, to string lights, to glow sticks, and everything else that created some sort of light. Both halves of the Psycho had only one goal in mind. To end this isolation. To prove they were better than before. To show her that they weren't so hopeless anymore.

By the time he was finished, there was a large pile of glowing objects surrounding the ruined town.

"Someone has to see this. Let's sleep. We've earned it." The calm inner voice declared.