Shenanigans!

[phaselocknroll]

Comments

[phaselocknroll]

[ Sarah points at a particular place on the map- a purple circle in an otherwise blue recreation of the forest and mountains.

"This is the blast site. Only trace amount of Eridium were uncovered, but it was enough to go on. My people have been digging, following the Eridium vein under the mountain. I just received word that they found some sort of tunnel or hallway. Something under that mountain has been hollowed out. We're betting it will lead us to the Vault, but I haven't sent people in for recon, yet." She pauses there, looking up at Peter and Maya.

"You two just became those people."

Maya gives Peter a quick glance before turning back to Sarah. ]

No signs of life down there, as far as you can tell?

[ The woman shakes her head. "We haven't picked anything up, but there's a lot of rock between us and the Vault." ]

[nostalgiabomb]

[ Peter takes another look at the map as Sarah speaks. He's got an eye for this kinda stuff, or at least he sort of learned how to pick out what he could and improvise. With the Ravagers, sometimes they could only nab blueprints moments before a heist. ]

So we head down, check the place out? Sounds easy enough.

[phaselocknroll]

[ "In so many words."

There's another pause, and Sarah puts her hand to her ear, listening for a moment on her comm.

"Go ahead and get going, but please, call off your friends before they kill any more of my men." ]

Will do. ... Thank you, Sarah.

[nostalgiabomb]

[ ... Peter has a second to think, Oh, fuck, right, before he quickly steps away, activating his mask. It's a weird quirk in his gear that he actually has to be wearing the damn thing for his comm to work -- he should probably see if Rocket can do anything about it.

As it is, he gives them a truncated version of what just transpired and tells them to fall back.

(No, Drax, you can't just kill one more of those "honorless soldiers"-- Say again, Rocket? What? No, no more grenades-- wait, what was that noise? God dammit, Rocket, I literally just said no more grenades! Seriously, guys, just-- stop killing folks unless they start it, okay?)

As he's removing his mask, he mumbles, ] What a bunch of a-holes.

[phaselocknroll]

[ Sarah merely quirks a brow, but Maya lets out a small laugh. The Guardians truly put the "fun" in "dysfunction". She wouldn't trade her new place in the Guardians for anything, but sometimes their antics made her painfully nostalgic for her own group of misfits back on Pandora.

She turns to Sarah and asks, ] Anything else?

[ Sarah shakes her head. "Nothing really. Just don't cause a scene on the way through the camp and you'll be fine."

A pause, then, "When you see Axton again, send him my regards."

Maya nods. She doesn't know where Sarah's willingness to stick her neck out for Axon comes from, considering she ended their marriage herself, but she's grateful for it. ]

Thank you Sarah. Truly.

[ And to Peter: ] Let's go.

[nostalgiabomb]

[ He nods his own thanks to Sarah, giving her a mock salute before he steps out. ]

So. As my Vault expert stand-in, any tips for the newbie?

[phaselocknroll]

Be ready for anything. I don't think we'll just find the Vault standing wide open, but history has shown that once we do get in, we have more of a chance of finding some ancient alien creature packing enough power to destroy the planet than we do of finding actual treasure.

[nostalgiabomb]

[ That gives him some pause, and then he looks seriously confused. ]

-- Wait, so an ancient alien dude has just been sitting around in a sealed up Vault, waiting for some pricks like us to go in and mess with it? And only then would he try to blow up the planet?

What did he do all day? Like, there are only so many rounds of Solitaire a guy can play before he gets bored.

[phaselocknroll]

Not an alien dude, Peter. An alien creature. We're two for two- Lilith and all of them discovered the Destroyer, which I don't have a whole lot of details on aside from the fact that there were a lot of tentacles involved.

My group had to deal with the Warrior, which was in some kind of hibernation state until Jack woke it up.

[nostalgiabomb]

[ Once again, he pauses and thinks, "Wouldn't an Infinity Stone be nice to deal with that?"

Then he thinks, "No, you fucking idiot, no, it wouldn't." ]

So I'm guessing a healthy application of physical violence will be enough to take care of it, right?

[phaselocknroll]

That's been the case so far.

[nostalgiabomb]

[ He nods, satisfied. ] Good. We can handle it, then. Probably time for pizza with those milkshakes, too.

[phaselocknroll]

On the upside, we don't have to fight our way there, so that should help.

[nostalgiabomb]

At least until we run face-first into some big, toothy, tentacley thing with giant weapons of mass destruction.

[ A beat, ]

This sounds boring. You wanna head back? I think we have some paint we can watch dry.

[phaselocknroll]

Doesn't it though? I mean, who really wants to do battle against a gigantic alient abonination?

[ Actually, she can think of several people. Mostly her fellow Guardians and Vault Hunters. ]

[nostalgiabomb]

[ He lets out a huge sigh and forges on. ]

Let's just get this over with. I don't wanna miss watching that grass grow, you know? Pretty sure Sprout is catching up to Blade.

[phaselocknroll]

[ she shoots him a sideways glance, one eyebrow arching ]

There are times I have to marvel at the sheer ludicrousness of our conversations.

[nostalgiabomb]

[ He returns her eyebrow arch with one of his own. ]

Just think -- this ludicrous guy right here? [ He points at himself with a thumb. ] You're dating him. Willingly, in fact. How weird is that, right?

[phaselocknroll]

You know what's even weirder?

I wouldn't trade this for the world.

[nostalgiabomb]

[ Peter shakes his head, resting a hand on her shoulder compassionately. ]

You've got issues, Maya. Really, really deep issues.

[phaselocknroll]

[ she heaves a dramatic sigh ] I know. It's a hard life.

[ in the time they've been talking, it's been easy enough to pick their way through the camp, and head out on the little trail leading to the blast site.

There are a pair of guards in front of the cave entrance, and Maya has no idea what Sarah told them, but they salute and let them pass without question.

The cave is lit by work lights plugged into generators, illuminating the shards of purple rock- raw Eridium- poking through the cave walls. It's hard to tell how long it goes on for. ]

Ready for some spelunking?

[nostalgiabomb]

[ Peter's only seen bits of Eridium up until now -- small chunks that were a little too similar to another glowing, purple stone he's seen before.

(The first time he saw Eridium he'd nearly had something like a war flashback. He shoved it down, though, and no one was the wiser.)

Now, though with the crystals jutting out of the walls -- he thinks it's kind of pretty. And to think, these stupidly valuable rocks have been on Earth all this time. He didn't have to get nabbed and smuggled into space to experience something alien. ]

I'm good if you are.

[phaselocknroll]

[ She notices him studying the Eridium, and flashes him a small smile as they head deeper into the cave. ]

That stuff’s pretty much useless when it’s unrefined, but some of the bandit clans on Pandora think you can get slag powers by swallowing it.

[nostalgiabomb]

[ He turns away from his examination of the wall to frown. ]

That's not true, right? That just sounds-- stupid.

[phaselocknroll]

Of course it’s not true. That would just be ridiculous. Also gross and probably deadly.

Who would even want slag powers?