Scientific Minds ch 2

I’ve been living with Sir Hammerlock for almost two months now.  I’ve become much less fanboyish than at first.  Although I still find myself smiling stupidly for no reason whenever I’m with him, I no longer get nervous and tongue-tied when we talk.  We’ve begun working together to research the social structures and behaviors of threshers, a subject with which we are both all too familiar.  I have no plans to move out, even though there are a few vacant houses in town.

I sit at the bar in Moxxxi’s.  I swish my beer impatiently, watching the liquid splash around.  Hammerlock walks in and sits beside me.

“Sorry about the wait, lad,” he says.  He sounds almost nervous.  As we begin talking about our recently collected data, I notice that he sounds distracted the entire time.

“Are you okay?” I ask.  It’s odd to see Hammerlock in such a strange mood.  He mutters something in response while wringing his hands anxiously.  He sighs and looks away.  I don’t know what to do.

“Peyne,” he begins.  He takes a deep breath, as if collecting his thoughts and building his courage.  “It’s not common that one finds a fellow scientific mind on Pandora, especially not one willing to stay on the planet.  Even rarer to find one that’s not completely insane.”  He stares at his hands as he speaks.  I’m not sure what to make of his speech.  He continues, shuffling awkwardly in his seat: “A-and it’s practically impossible for that mind to be found behind a beautiful face.”

“What?  Do you need help getting a girlfriend or something?” I laugh, hoping to hide my confusion.  I was a bit worried; it’s not like Hammerlock to ramble like this.

“Not quite,” he chuckles, finally looking at me.  He’s blushing, and I can’t help but think it’s kind of cute.  “Peyne, you’re a brilliant scientist, but I doubt you’ll understand unless I tell you outright.”

“Tell me what outright?”

“Peyne, I love you.”  He reaches out and holds my hand.  

I feel myself start to blush.  I look down at his hand on mine, and smile.  I can’t think of anything to say, so I look back at him; he’s smiling shyly at me.  He begins to pull his hand away.  I grab his hand and pull him towards me.  As he leans forward, I wrap my hands around the back of his head and pull him into a kiss.

Closing my eyes, I feel him gasp as our lips touch.  He begins to kiss me back and he lays his hands on my shoulders.  I begin to wonder just how long we’ve been kissing...

“You boys are gonna need to breathe eventually,” I hear a voice laugh.  Hammerlock and I break our kiss reluctantly, blushing as we turn to see Moxxi leaned over the bar, staring at us with a big grin.  “Need a room?” she asks with a giggle.

“I don’t think that will be necessary,” Hammerlock answers as he straightens his hat.  “But perhaps we would benefit from a bit of time alone.”  He stands up, grabs my hand and we walk out of the bar.  I don’t know what to think, but I can’t help but grin stupidly.

“So, uh, what now?” I ask as we walk through the city, still holding hands.  I feel like an idiot making awkward small-talk, but Hammerlock just smiles at me.

“I suppose this is the part where I ask you on a date, lad,” he says.  “Though planning a romantic outing on Pandora may prove to be difficult.”

“Depends on your idea of romance,” I answer with a blush.  I bite my lip and look down at the ground.  “Maybe you could just come out into the field with me some time for research.  Maybe do some Varkid hunting out in the Tundra Express.”  I look up as he puts an arm around my waist and smiles.

“It’s been a few years since I’ve gone out into the field.  But it could be fun to go hunting again.”  He hesitates for a moment.  “For today though, I think we should go home.  Maybe, settle our nerves.”

“That sounds like a good idea,” I reply.  The day resumes with our usual talks about our research.  We go buy some new guns from Marcus and prepare for tomorrow’s... er, date at the Tundra Express.

When we go to bed, I lie on the sofa staring at the ceiling.  My mind is racing, and I can’t sleep.  I sit up and rub my eyes, unsure of how to feel.  I’ve never been attracted to a man before.  Hell, I’d barely been attracted to women.  I had only had three girlfriends in my life, and none of them were long term.  I’ve generally avoided relationships, so why now?  Why him?  I fall back on the sofa and pull the blanket over my head.  I eventually fall asleep.

In the morning, we collect our supplies, go to the Fast Travel station in the center of town and teleport to the Tundra Express.

“Where should we set up post, lad?” Hammerlock asks as he pulls out a Jakobs sniper rifle.  I look around the snow-covered hills, and finally resting on the old lookout tower near the center of the area.

“I think we should settle up in Mordecai’s sniper tower.  We can snipe from there a while, and once the bulk of the bugs are gone, we can go down and pick up some of the remains for research on our way back.”  I take out my own gun, an incendiary Maliwan sniper rifle.  Hammerlock smiles over at me as he loads his rifle.

“Sounds like a plan.  Shall we?” he asks, gesturing toward the sniper tower, built atop a small mountain.  

We walk down the path and out into the field, among the Varkid nests.  The bugs begin screeching loudly as they crawl out of the nests.  Hammerlock runs ahead and I follow.  We run through the field and around the East side of the tower.  The only way into the tower is through Tiny Tina’s workshop, so we slow down as we approach the entrance.  Careful to avoid the mines that litter the ground, and more careful not to spook Tina, we walk in.

“Tina!” I greet the young bomb maker.  

“Oh, hai!” she calls out to me.  “What’s up, Docta Robo-man?”

“Good to see ya, kid.  Think you can let us in to the sniper tower?”

“Ooooh!” Tina giggles.  “You gonna SPLATTER some bug brains, boi?”

“That’s the plan,” I reply.

Hammerlock watches Tina silently as she runs into her shack and returns with a key in hand.  Judging from his puzzled expression, I doubt he’s ever met her before.  

“I’ll give yas da keys, but ya gots ta come to a tea party some time, kay?”

“Sure thing,” I say with a smile as Tina hands me the key.  I take Hammerlock’s hand and we walk up the stairs to the sniper tower.  We ride the elevator up to the top balcony.  At the top, Hammerlock looks over the edge.

“There’s quite a few of the buggers out there,” he laughs.  “But there’s an awful lot of bandits running around as well.  They could easier get in the way.”

“Knowing the bandits, they’ll probably empty a hundred rounds just to kill a couple of them, and they’d probably raid the bodies for food,” I grumble.  “I think we should take them out first.  Sound good?”  Hammerlock nods.

“There’s only two bandit camps close by, so we should be able to take them out quickly,” he muses, walking around the balcony.  “One camp to the southeast across from Tiny Tina’s home, and another at the base of the mountain on which we’re currently standing.  Shouldn’t be more than fifty in all.”

“Well then, let’s get started.  I’ll take the southeast camp, you take the other?” I ask as I ready my rifle.

“Sounds like a plan, lad,” he answers.  “Let’s get started, shall we?”  We walk to opposite ends of the balcony and begin to fire.  Screams and gunfire fill the air, but only a handful of bullets even come close to the sniper tower.  Of those, two hit me.  Assault rifle shots, I think, but they barely nicked my shields.

“Are you okay over there?” I call out in between shots.  “Getting shot at all?”  Hammerlock laughs loudly at the question.

“I’m fine.  These ruffians are bloody terrible shots.  And most of them have started shooting each other.  Ah well, makes them easier targets that way.”  He resumes shooting and I do the same.  Just a few minutes later I hear Hammerlock stop firing.  I look over my shoulder to see him walk over to me.  “Looks like you need a little help,” he laughs as he takes out a bruiser bandit on whom I had just landed my crosshairs.

“Well, that should take care of the bandits for now.”  I look across the field as I toss the empty casings and reload my rifle.  “Looks like the varkids are coming out now.”  To my side, Sir Hammerlock leans over the guard rail and counts the varkids as they crawl out of their nests and begin scurring about.

“Looks to be twenty-five or so in each area, lad,” Hammerlock muses to himself.

“Only twenty-five?  I could off a whole group in less than two minutes.”  As I talk, I set up my rifle on the railing, positioning my aim toward the varkids below.

“Two minutes?” Hammerlock scoffs.  “Well then, let’s see it!  I’ll keep time for you.”

“Sure thing.”  I put my eye to the scope and fire.  The sound of gunfire startles the varkids and they begin to scurry about in a panic.  One by one, the varkids charred corpses begin to litter the field.  

“That’s all of them,” I announce as the last bug dies in a ball of fire.  I stand up and prop the rifle on the railing.  “How’d I do?”  Hammerlock looks down at his stopwatch with a smirk.

“One minute and fifty-two seconds,” he says.  “Not too bad, I suppose.”

“Think you can beat my time?  There’s another group up north,” I offer.  Hammerlock takes up his rifle and walks to the north end of the tower.  He tosses his stopwatch to me.

“Time for an old man to show his moves,” he grins.  He begins firing.  I thought I had done well, but even taking advantage of my incendiary rounds, I had nothing on Hammerlock.  He never missed a single shot.  I was surprised with his speed firing a bolt-action Jakobs rifle.  I silently cursed to myself as he killed the last varkid.

“A minute forty-nine,” I sigh.  “You really are an amazing hunter.”

“You flatter me, my boy,” he chuckles softly, planting a shy kiss on my cheek as he walks by.  “Now then, shall we collect the specimens?”

“Let’s go, then,” I answer.  I open the door to the elevator. We store our rifles in our backpacks and ride the elevator back down, to Tina’s workshop.  We see Tina taking a nap as we exit the elevator, so we leave the key on the table and go on our way.

Varkid corpses litter the field, but we can’t use most of them.  We walk through the area, picking up the bugs and inspecting them one by one.  After about half an hour of silent work, we bag the five best specimens from each group.  We begin walking toward the fast travel station.  Seems like I’ve got quite the interesting future ahead of me here on Pandora I think as we return home.