Chapter Text
Helios was tilted East.
The Eye of Helios was no longer looking down at the border planet below, and so the residents of the space station were not able to see what burned beneath them.
But Handsome Jack could. Long ago his office was lit with hues and tints of blue and red from Elips. Now it was as bright as if it were facing the sun. It was a light that never went out, and so during most of the cycles, the shutters were down so he could have a moment of peace from the burning planet below.
The Warrior had succeeded; perhaps a little too well. It's fire never stopped. No method known to man could put out its flames as they swept across the planet.
Pandora had been burning for ten years.
Jack watched over Pandora for the first three years and, as progress on the mines automated, he stationed himself over Athenas; new vaults were calling to him. The king had returned only recently to his throne as the fire was threatening some of Hyperions older facilities and whispers of treachery had reached him; that his vision for Pandora was nothing but the utter failures of a mad man.
The Warrior was faithful and burned down bandit camp after bandit camp, including the once famous Sanctuary. It was ironic, really, watching that Firehawk bitch burn alive. It left him laughing for days at the sounds of her screams. And, after Jack was finished celebrating, his precious PA didn’t walk straight for a week. The rest of the vault hunters were taken alive and now spent the last of their days in a high-security Hyperion prison. Some had taken their lives rather than be incarcerated; Typical bandit behaviour.
No plan was perfect; once or twice the warrior's flames strayed and took a Hyperion settlement with it. This was one of those occasions.
Jack waved a hand forward, searching the files recovered from the last facility. The men stationed there were more than a little rattled. Some echo logs were long lost-in-thought ramblings, others featured men putting a gun to their head and firing, most of them had little to no substance.
Jack cleared his throat and sat upright; his PA was calling.
"Sir," Rhys' voice was a little breathless, strained even. "Turn the body cams on, operation Virgo-12, NOW."
Jack's teeth clenched as the request became an order, but he did as instructed.
" Sir ," Rhys pressed. "Turn the feed on now."
"Alright!" he swiped away his current work and summoned the live record for the operation. There were seven body cams to choose from, Jack selected the leader's and activated the feed. There was a moment of static as the connection was made and Jack leaned back into his chair and kicked his feet onto his desk.
"Fuck! this is fucked!-" A voice called from behind sergeant.
The barrel of a rifle was aimed ahead amongst a dark room. There was a familiar glow of Eridium in the corners of the feed that revealed little a sparse and rusted hall.
"Handsome Jack, sir, are you receiving?"
"Yes," Jack replied and rubbed at his eyes.
"The main science division is secured, but sir, we found another lab down through a tunnel. My men are securing it now, but it appears –"
"FUCK!" Another man yelled from behind, and the sergeant swerved around making the feed blur.
Tanks lined the walls, some of them filled with rotting corpses submerged in a dark green formula, while others had cracked and spilled there - presumably once alive - contents across the floor.
"The fuck went on down here!?"
"Move out!"
Jack leaned forward and rested his head in his hands. The lighting was terrible, but the sergeant activated his torch and provided a bland commentary.
"I don't think anything is alive down here. Whatever this is, it's not Hyperion sanctioned. We've got ID's here on stolen and missing equipment. Sir, some of this dates back to twelve years ago."
Jack frowned and tried to recall what the science division was up to back then. It was mostly focused on charging the vault key and mining improvements. Who the hell was in charge of R&D back then?
The sergeant moved into a room cleared by his men.
"We've got no ID on what was in the tanks, too decomposed at this stage to tell."
The men moved through the darkness, their flashlights casting a pale beam of light on the world around them. The light fell on a rotting carcass that must have once been human but was now so scavenged by rats and time that it would be impossible to tell who it was anymore. A few men made a repulsed noise, and one of them commented on the smell.
A sharp noise – metal rattling down at their feet – drew the view down to the sergeant’s feet. An empty tin can had been kicked.
"Something was living down here for a while." The sergeant commented while his boot toed what Jack recognised as long-past issue date digistructed meal.
There was a panicked scream and one of the lifelines of the men went dead. The feed jerked upwards and faced the hall, but the flashlight scarcely pierced the dust and filth.
Soon, a second scream came, followed by a third; both men went into shock with massive lacerations recorded on both their bodies.
There was a sharp intake of breath from the sergeant and Jack paused, eyes narrowing at the dark feed. The camera swivelled towards the source of dying men and there, crouched by a shattered tank, covered in blood and armed with a shard of glass was a man.
His hair fell in matted knots to his shoulders, framing his ghostly, thin face like a cowl. Most unsettling of all were the eyes; pale and distant.
Jack recognized this man almost instantly.
"No, no, no, no," Jack whispered and stood up so that his face was inches from the feed.
“Identify yourself!” the sergeant barked. The man’s head turned towards them, giving the men a clearer view. They could now all see what Jack already suspected.
The telltale chin.
The prominent cheekbones
Bi-coloured eyes.
The man before them was a 'Jack'.
The door to his office swung open and hurried footsteps came to his desk.
"Sir, it's alive," Rhys said breathlessly while holding a tablet to his chest. "What do you want to do?"
"Is it him?"
"It's not Lawrence, sir." Rhys' cut him off and closed in behind the desk.
Jack hissed but didn't break eye contact with the recording.
"A clone?” Jack muttered and closed his eyes, rubbing at his temple.
"Yes, sir. It appears so."
Jack should probably kill it. After all, there was no need for another body double. The thing looked pitiful. It was hardly a comparison to the real Jack, being so thin and decrepit. Even a bullet would be a waste of lead on the thing.
“It’s not Law –”
“I know!”
Rhys flinched but did not back away. Too many years of office stationery thrown across rooms and men air-locked had trained his PA’s composure.
" Jack ," Rhys' voice stressed the unspoken warning. They both knew where his mind wanted to wander.
Jack couldn’t help it. The memory was too vivid, too intoxicating to ignore. When he snuffed the life out of another man who looked just like him, watching the final struggle as death took him.
"Jack. What do I tell them?"
At last, he took in a breath and gave his answer.
"Bring it here."