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We're onto Tales from the Borderlands so we get out sweet boy Rhys now pog.
(Also sorry this took a while, most know, but a lot of things went to shit recently. First I have finals coming up and my cat died recently so I've been mourning that and I also have been spending a good bit of time with Vladimir and my new boyfriend, so there's just a lot going on.)
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-RHYS POV-

Life is crazy. You never know what's going to happen. For example, one second you could be working for the biggest company in the universe and next thing you know you could be stranded on one of the most deadly planets in the universe. Just an example. Definitely didn't happen to me...

I am definitely not walking with only one shoe remaining through the Pandoran desert and I am not at all cursed by an AI of one of the most dangerous jackasses to ever exist who only I can see... and my best friend definitely doesn't think I'm insane...

"Yeah, I don't what state of being I'm in right now, but uh... well walking still sucks." The hologram of Handsome Jack stated as we walked through the Pandoran desert. So,... maybe it wasn't just an example...

"Man... what are the odds..." Vaughn says.

Jack questions him before I can say anything. "What does he mean?"

"Yeah, what do you mean?" I agree with the apparition.

"Well I mean, of all the people in the universe, Handsome Jack could be... appearing to... it just happens to be the guy who's totally obsessed with him. I mean, that's crazy... It's like destiny..." I feel myself grow embarrassed and a sour look is directed at me from Jack.

"Uh... What? Sh-should I be creeped out right now? Cause I'm feeling a little creeped out." He questions sounding unsettled.

"This is just a coincidence, Vaughn. Men make their own destiny." I try to get off the subject.

"You sound like Vasquez." The weirdly buff nerd expresses.

"Y-you sound, uh... like you're dodging the question. Ah, you obsessed with me, cupcake?" Jack intervenes trying to get an answer out of me.

"I mean, think about it... You got all those Handsome Jack posters in your office, dude... I think that's a little weird." Vaughn continues to make the situation worse.

We stop walking and the two face me confrontationally.

"That makes two of us." The hologram points out.

I cut in and try to explain myself, "Those are motivational posters, you know, like the cat hangin-? They're Hyperion issued."

I turn away and start walking again as to try to stop the conversation.

"Well, maybe it has something to do with the Nakayama drive." Vaughn says.

"Namayaka... w-why's that sound familiar..." Jack butchers the name of the scientist.

"I did shove a bunch of data, you know, straight into my head..."

Jack finally remembers what he was trying to, "Oh, Nakayama. Right. The weirdo that was obsessed with me. The other weirdo that was obsessed with me..." I feel myself grow embarrassed again.

"Oh man... Hyperion would kill to get their hands on this..." Vaughn interjects out of nowhere.

"This?" I turn to question him and we stop walking again.

"You! Your... head, or body, or... whatever Jack is in."

"Yeah... they would, wouldn't they?" The mentioned man questions in a menacing way. Not scary or worrying at all...

"Whatever version of Jack you've got in there, Nakayama stored it for a reason." Vaughn states.

"Damn right! Even this idiot gets it." Jack backhandedly insults me.

I think it over a moment, yes we could get our jobs back, but who knows what Hyperion would do with AI of the Handsome Jack? "We can't take Jack back to Hyperion... He's too dangerous."

"What? No, no, no, no, no! You need to get me back to Helios." He demands.

"Yeah... you're probably right." Vaughn agrees with me and we continue through the desert.

"No! No, you are definitely wrong. This is torture, that's-that's what it is. I'm in hell. This is what hell is!" Jack exaggerates.

Vaughn looks up at a noise and exclaims, "It's about time!"

From Helios we see a shipment start flying in our direction. Probably the supplies Yvette is sending us.

"Hopefully she included some water." I hear Vaughn mumble.

We watch the incoming shipment that is coming for us.

"Uh oh. Incoming! Yeah! Guess that tracker's workin', huh, boys!" Jack laughs out while standing right in front of us.

What is he laughing about?

"It's coming right for us..."
Then it clicks in my head as I look at the trajectory of the shipment
"It's coming right for us!"

Jack laughs as the capsule comes right at him. "Come to papa!"

The capsule lands right on Jack and he disappears as Vaughn and I dodge. It opens to reveal a familiar red and gold Hyperion car. It pulls up in front of us and the window rolls down to reveal just who I hoped it wasn't.

He eyes us up and down and of course he notices my lack of shoe. "Nice sock." The asshole jokes.

He exits the vehicle and pulls out a large gun. I meet eyes with Vaughn and we share an equally worried look.
"Fancy meetin' you two here. Here I was out for a nice drive... And I land right on just the guys I was lookin' for." Vasquez says.

"It's red, Hugo... I thought you wanted your car in black." I try make fun of him.

He laughs in a sarcastic manner. "I see what you did there, that's funny. You steal my car, you make jokes about it. That's good. That's great stuff."
Vasquez starts to walk towards us and we back away.

"Look, I know we had a deal... And while I don't like to go back on an agreement made man to man... the circumsta-"

I start to cut him off to say that I never accepted his shitty deal, but Vaughn speaks up first.

"That's right we did have a deal!" I stop moving and stare at Vaughn shocked.

"You convince me to double-cross my best friend, and the day isn't even over before you're double-crossing me?" He yells.

"Tha- uh... What?" I try to question him but the words don't come out.

Vaughn just looks at me with guilt and shakes his head.

"Should've known better than to trust a snake like you." He says to Vasquez.

"Oh don't be like that, little guy. It's just the way of the, uh... Listen. I'm gonna go see if I got a shirt in the trunk. 'Cause your body is making me uncomfortable. Hold tight, kids." He turns away to walk to the trunk.

I give Vaughn a look as to ask for an explanation.

"Look. I told him I would sell you out, but I swear I wasn't gonna do it. I was just saying whatever he wanted to hear just to keep that jerk off our backs." He tries to explain himself.

I hear Vasquez open the trunk of the car.

"I wasn't gonna follow through with it. Please believe me." He pleads with me.

"We'll talk about this later." I decide that now isn't the best time to talk about this.

"Okay... okay, that works. I guess, I just-"

Vasquez is suddenly back with two shovels. He throws one to the ground in front of us and then throws the next one into my arms.

"What's that?" I ask.

"They're shovels, genius. You two freaks start digging. I wanna see a decent grave before too long." He points the gun at us and Vaughn picks up the shovel from the ground.

I don't start digging and he then points the gun at me. "You heard me." He threatens.

"Ohh, you're going to pay for this. You'll see. Yeah cause we have friends. Dangerous friends that will hunt you down to the ends of Pandora." I try to bluff and look at Vaughn trying to get him to play along.

"Well, that, that, uh, that sounds exhausting. Well I guess it's a good thing I'll be leaving this ball of hot garbage real soon." He shrugs off my threat.

I look at the shovel and try to think of any way to get out of this.

"What part of "dig" don't you understand?! Let's get going Mr.Universe!"

"Okay! Just... don't shoot." Vaughn pleads and starts to dig.

"There ya go. A little hard work never killed anybody..."

We dig the rough ground beneath us and Vaughn gives me a worried glance.

"Dig faster. Time is money, Rhys." Vasquez taunts me.

"Really? You want me to dig my own grave faster." I shoot back.

He walks up close to me and I think he's just going to threaten me again, but I'm proven wrong by him suddenly headbutting me. But from the sound of it he hurt himself too, if not more than he hurt me.

"Ughh Agh! Damn. Damn that smarts. I think I did that wrong. I... you got a tough noggin. Looks so easy in the movies, but-" He cuts himself off, probably embarrassed.

I hear a distorted voice speak. "Amateur hour. You gotta aim for the bridge of the nose, Dum-Dum." I hear the newly reappeared Jack make fun of Vasquez.
"How is it every time I show up you idiots are in a worse situation?" His voice is now clear of any distortion.

"You're not helping." I whisper angrily to the hologram.

"Is there a problem sir?" A new voice calls out. I look over at the car and of course it just so happens that the most feared soldier in all of Hyperion is here.

I watch as the soldier as he walks over to Vasquez and inspects his condition. Once he's done he looks directly at me. I can't see his eyes, but it feels like he's making eye contact. It might just be the fact that even the thought of him staring at me scares the hell out of me, but the look from him sends tremors of fear up my spine.

I watch as Jack perks up at the appearance of the guard.

"Oh hell yeah!" He exclaims. "Listen here Rhysie," he gets close to me "this guy right here could very well be your ticket out." I wait for him to explain. "This guy is literally made to serve who he sees as the current most powerful employee in Hyperion. Sooo, if you're able to make yourself seem stronger than this jerkoff, this guy will follow your every order. It'll be a piece of cake with this idiot being your competition. There's no way my weapon sees him as a strong figure."

How the hell am I supposed to do that???
I question in my head.

"Alright, fun's over! Looks like we'll be settling for the shallow variety of grave." Vasquez exclaims as he finally recovers.
He points the gun at us and we all grow scared.

"Rhys you die first and then he can load your body in the car. I'll bury Vaughn myself." Vasquez reveals to us his plan.

"What?" Vaughn questions.

"Yeah, they want this idiot's body for something up there. Something, ah, important floating around in his head."
Vasquez explains and Jack and I share a concerned look.

Vasquez directs the attention to his gun. "This is a prototype. The most advanced gun Hyperion has ever made."

"Someone's overcompensating." Jack jokes before we both grow scared again as he starts the... gun.. lazer? Only he can't seem to figure out how to actually shoot it.

"Any... last words? Before the... how does it, with the..." He mumbles as he tries to figure out the gun.

"Two. Eat Shit." I respond.

"Yeah! That's the spirit." Jack cheers me on.

"Well that was three words. But I'll be sure to put "ate shit" on your tombstone." I watch as the soldier crosses his arm in a seemingly tired manner as he watches Vasquez struggle with the gun.

"You know. I'd be more worried about my tombstone if you knew where the safety was." I make fun of him and I feel the eyes of the guard land on me again causing me to tense up.

"You're hilarious. I'm gonna miss your- Gosh damn it!" He whispers the last part under his breath.

"Is... there a problem there?" Vaughn ask.

"I know how to shoot a gun! I just want to get the maximum damage out of this thing..."

"It is really starting to seem like you don't know how to shoot a gun, sir." I look at the soldier shocked as he talked back to Vasquez. He's never been known to act like that.

Maybe he really doesn't see Vasquez strongly like Jack said?

"Goddamn! Who taught my pet how to sass people? Hell I might just like him more now!" Jack cheered.

"Just shut up okay?! I got it!" Vasquez reprimanded the soldier.

Jack walks close to me again to talk. "Okay, look. As much as I'd love to watch this idiot kill you two idiots, I can't let that happen. I'm, I'm... inside of- I'm not inside you, but I'm like- Look, if you go, I go. I've enhanced your ECHOeye, so use it to hack something and get us the hell out of this jam. You figure out how you can pay me back later. I've got your back." He goes to pat my shoulder but his arm phases through me. "Right. Okay, mess this guy up."

I use my newly upgraded ECHOeye to scan the gun and use the advanced features to overload the gun. It explodes in Vasquez's hands causing him to fall to the ground. Interestingly enough, the soldier doesn't move to help him, he just continues to stare at me.

"Burns, doesn't it?" Jack laughs and points at Vasquez. My mechanical arm raises with his, no longer in my control.

"What are you doing with your hands?" Vaughn ask as I try to get my arm down.

"I-I-I'm not doing that!"

"Oh... Hello... This is an interesting little development." Jack says and controls my arm to face upwards.

"Fine, look, we've gotta go!" Vaughn tries to get me to get moving.

Jack tries to move my arm again as I fight back. "This... is... MY head! Get out!" I loose my grip and the arm punches me in the face.

"Aww, you see, you see what you did. You hit yourself-" Jack gets cut off as he disappears again.

"RHYS!" Vaughn shouts in warning, but I realize what's happening too late to stop it. I feel a rough form come into contact quickly with mine as I'm tackled to the ground.

The guard looms over me and stares down at my form. His gaze feels like he's breaking me apart and examining every piece.
"You. You're like-" he's cut off as Vaughn kicks him off me and he pulls me up for us to run away as I notice Vasquez is getting up.

I look behind us and see Vasquez get into the car as the soldier jumps onto the roof and holds on.

"Yeah! Go ahead and run! You're just makin' this funner for me!" Vasquez shouts.

He gets closer and closer. Almost hitting us with the front of the car. "I'm gonna kill you!" Vasquez yells once again.

Just as I feel the cold material of the soldier's glove brush against me as he tries to grab me, familiar metal arms grab Vaughn and I, saving us from vehicular manslaughter.

"Loader Bot!" I can't help but to cheer at the appearance of my robot (son?).

"Yeah! I knew Yvette wouldn't let us down!" Vaughn celebrates.

"I missed you." The robot greets us mechanically.

"I missed you more." I respond to the robot in a motherly tone.

"This isn't over! You hear me? You hear me?" I hear Vasquez yell from a distance.

But all I can think about is the soldier who acted so strange and the words of Handsome Jack.

If I prove myself stronger than Vasquez he'll follow me?

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Sunny: I don't really like this chapter much. I had to get a LOT of cannon dialog in here. Of course I changed some things, but for the most part this is just a transition into the next part of the story.

It may or may not be close to our favorite boy, Zer0, time. But you didn't hear that from me ;)