Chapter 24: Jamming Signal (1)

Having finished his conversation with Angel, Alexander turned his attention to Moxxi's bar. The garish neon sign flickered, casting an eerie glow on the grimy streets. He hadn't heard from Moxxi in weeks, not since her contract ended.

The bar's doors hissed open, and Alexander stepped into a cacophony of laughter, clinking glasses, and pounding music. His gaze immediately locked onto two familiar faces at the bar – Roland and Lilith, locked in an intimate embrace.

Alexander didn't acknowledge them as he made his way to the bar, his expression remaining stoic despite the palpable discomfort in the air.

Moxxi's painted lips curled into a smile as she spotted him. "Well, sugar, look what the Rakk dragged in. To what do I owe the pleasure?"

Alexander leaned against the bar, his voice low and authoritative. "I need information, Moxxi. There's a jamming signal on this rock, and I need to know where it's coming from."

Moxxi's eyes sparkled with interest. "Always business with you, isn't it? And here I thought you might finally be taking me up on my standing offer."

"The signal, Moxxi," Alexander pressed, his tone unyielding.

She sighed dramatically, reaching for a glass. "You're no fun, sugar. But I might know a thing or two. What's in it for me?"

Before Alexander could respond, the bar's doors opened again. Athena entered first, her face a mask of frustration. Timothy followed his resemblance to Jack uncanny, save for the nervous twitch in his eye. Claptrap rolled in last, blissfully unaware of the tension in the room.

Moxxi's eyes widened slightly at the sight of Timothy. A knowing smile played across her lips. "Well, hello there, handsome. You look... familiar."

Timothy swallowed hard, his Adam's apple bobbing. "I, uh... I get that a lot."

Alexander's gaze remained fixed on Moxxi. "You know something."

Moxxi's eyes never left Timothy as she spoke. "Maybe. But information doesn't come cheap, sugar. Especially when it's about old flames."

Across the bar, Lilith's curiosity got the better of her. She approached, dragging a reluctant Roland behind her. "Alexander? What's going on?"

Athena stepped forward, her voice clipped. "The Meriff refused to see us. Claims he's too busy with 'official business.'"

Claptrap's enthusiastic voice cut through the tension. "But don't worry, minion! I'm sure we'll find another way to save the day! Maybe we could throw a party and invite the jamming signal. Then, when it least expects it – BAM! We hit it with a surprise attack!"

Roland pinched the bridge of his nose, a sigh escaping. "Some things never change."

Alexander ignored the exchange, his focus solely on Moxxi. "What do you know about the signal?"

Moxxi's playful demeanour shifted slightly. "Not much, sugar. But the word is, you might find more information at Triton Flats. I've heard whispers, slight tounges here and there. Just be careful out there. It's not exactly a friendly neighbourhood."

Alexander's eyes narrowed. "We need more information. Any ideas on how to track this signal?"

Moxxi tapped her chin thoughtfully. "You might want to talk to Janey Springs. She's got a knack for cobbling together tech from junk."

They found Janey in her workshop, tinkering with a piece of salvaged equipment. Her face lit up at the sight of them. "Well, if it isn't the most interesting folks on Elpis! What can I do for ya?"

Athena spoke first, "We require your assistance once, more specifically regarding signal-tracking equipment." 

Janey's eyes sparkled with excitement. "Oh, that's a juicy challenge! We'll need some transmitters and receivers. I know just the place to get 'em, but you're not gonna like it."

Timothy groaned. "Please don't say-"

"Crazy Earl!" Janey announced cheerfully.

After a tense negotiation involving an absurd amount of moon rocks and a promise to never speak of what they saw in Earl's back room, the team acquired the necessary equipment.

Back at Moxxi's, they laid out their plan. Moxxi leaned over the bar, pointing at a crude map of Concordia. "You'll need to place these gizmos on the highest points in town. That means the rooftops, sugar."

Alexander nodded. "How do we get up there?"

Moxxi's painted lips curled into a smile. "There are some deactivated jump pads around town. A little tinkering should get them working again."

With Janey's technical expertise and Claptrap's... enthusiasm, they managed to reactivate the jump pads. Soon, they were bounding across Concordia's rooftops, placing transmitters and receivers at strategic points.

As they worked, snippets of conversation floated up from the streets below.

At one point, they overheard a hushed conversation near the medical clinic.

"No, Mama, I cannot come home. Is not safe. They still looking for me," Nina's thick accent carried on the thin air.

Alexander's eyes narrowed. "Interesting. Seems our good nurse has a complicated past."

At another location, they picked up Janey's voice.

"Moxxi? You around? I, uh, was wondering if you wanted to grab a drink sometime?" Janey's usually confident voice sounded nervous.

Moxxi, monitoring their progress via ECHO, sighed. "Poor girl. She's sweet, but not really my type."

The final transmitter needed to be placed atop the Meriff's tower. As they approached, they heard voices through an open window.

"Oh, come now, my dear. Surely a little oil change wouldn't hurt?" The Meriff's slimy voice made Timothy shudder.

A robotic voice responded, sounding uncomfortable. "Sir, I must remind you that inappropriate contact with Moxxi's staff is strictly prohibited."

Moxxi's voice crackled over their ECHOs, furious. "That slimy bastard! I've warned him about harassing my girls!"

With the transmitters in place, the team returned to Moxxi's bar. The data they'd gathered painted a complex picture of Concordia's underworld, but the source of the jamming signal remained elusive.

Alexander leaned against the bar, his face a mask of frustration. "We're missing something. The signal has to be coming from somewhere nearby."

Moxxi nodded, her earlier shock at their intrusion now replaced by determination. "You're right, sugar. But with the lockdown in place, our options are limited."

The team gathered around, discussing potential solutions. Ideas were tossed back and forth – everything from impersonating Hyperion officials to staging a mock kraggon attack.

As the debate heated up, Alexander noticed Moxxi slipping behind the bar, likely to compose herself after the long day. He filed the information away, focusing on the task at hand.

It wasn't until some time later that he found himself attempting to communicate with his men only to find the action null. The jamming signal was doing more than just hindering Hyperion it was also hindering his actions with communicating with his men initially stationed with Moxxi. 

He needed their whereabouts. 

It was the B4R-BOT unit behind the counter that finally provided the solution. As it polished glasses, its robotic voice chirped, "Did someone say they needed a way out? There's always Moxxi's super-secret workshop behind the bar! It's got a back door and everything!"

The bar fell silent. 

With a swift nod to Athena, they moved behind the bar. His keen eyes scanned the wall until he spotted a slight irregularity. Pressing his hand against it, he felt a hidden button give way.

A soft hiss filled the air as a section of the wall slid upward, revealing a dimly lit passage beyond.

"After you," Alexander gestured to his team, his face impassive.

As they filed into the secret workshop, the sight that greeted them was far from what they expected. Moxxi stood there, her usual impeccable makeup absent, her hair in disarray. But it was her voice that shocked them most.

"Well, hot damn! Y'all weren't supposed to see this!" The thick, redneck accent was a far cry from her usual sultry tones.

Timothy's jaw dropped. "Holy shi-"

Moxxi's eyes flashed dangerously. "If any of y'all breathe a word of this, I swear I'll-"

Alexander held up a hand, silencing her. "Your secret's safe, Moxxi. But we need that exit. Now."

For a moment, Moxxi looked like she might argue. Then, with a resigned sigh, she pointed to a rusted door at the back of the workshop. "That'll take you straight to Triton Flats. But y'all owe me for this."

As they made their way to the door, Alexander paused. He turned back to Moxxi, his expression unreadable. "When this is over, we'll talk about renegotiating your contract."

A glimmer of hope flashed in Moxxi's eyes, quickly masked by her usual coy smile. "I'll hold you to that, sugar."

"Before I leave, what of my men that were initially sent with you? Where have they gone?" Alexander asked, the site of his men at the bar missing. With the signal taken down, their last ping was over forty-eight hours ago meaning they were either ambushed or taken hostage.

"They usually frequented the bar sugar... but two days ago they went missing. I'm unsure where they're gone now. You're most likely to find them wherever you're goin' ~." 

With a final nod, Alexander led his team through the door and into the unknown dangers of Triton Flats. The jamming signal was out there somewhere, and he was determined to find it – no matter the cost.

As the door closed behind them, Moxxi let out a long breath. She reached for a bottle of her strongest moonshine, muttering under her breath. "That man's gonna be the death of me."

Outside, the harsh landscape of Triton Flats stretched before them. Alexander's eyes scanned the horizon, his mind already formulating their next move. The jamming signal was out there somewhere, and he would find it. He had to.

"Alright, team," he said, his voice carrying the weight of command. "Let's move out. We've got a signal to find and a station to take."

As they set off across the barren moonscape, Alexander couldn't shake the feeling that he was being watched. Turning to look around he found nothing, his eyes even peering with clairvoyance with no energy signatures present. 

"Strange..." Alexander murmured his suspicions of the strange alien ever present, he'd have to maintain vigilance. 

The air crackled with tension as Alexander and his crew found themselves caught between two of Elpis' most notorious factions. On one side stood Papa Crust, his paint-splattered armour a riot of colours.

Papa Crust "For the revolution!" (And the occasional art exhibition)

Papa Crust twirled his modified paint gun, grinning maniacally. "Welcome, fellow revolutionaries, to the canvas of chaos! Today, we paint the moon red... and blue... and maybe a little chartreuse!"

Opposite him, Fair Dinkum spat on the ground, his scarred face twisted in a permanent scowl.

Fair Dinkum "He ain't fair" (But he's sure as hell Dinkum)

"Cut the artsy fartsy crap, Crust," Fair Dinkum growled, checking the chambers of his twin pistols. "We've got bigger fish to fry."

Alexander watched the exchange, his black eyes analyzing every movement, every micro-expression. The uneasy truce between these factions was a powder keg waiting to explode.

Suddenly, a voice piped up from the crowd. "Uh, guys? I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but..." It was Claptrap, rolling forward with his usual lack of situational awareness. "I just remembered! Mundo was totally working for the Iron Legion! Oops, was that supposed to be a secret?"

The silence that followed was deafening. Then, all at once, chaos erupted.

"Betrayal!" Papa Crust cried, his paint gun spewing a technicolour nightmare. "The revolution will not be colourized!"

Fair Dinkum's guns roared to life. "I knew it! You artsy types can't be trusted!"

In the blink of an eye, the battlefield transformed into a psychedelic war zone. Papa Crust's PLA forces unleashed a barrage of paint grenades, coating everything in sight with explosive colours. Darksiders returned fire with a hail of bullets, creating a deadly crossfire.

Alexander's team sprang into action. Athena's energy shield hummed to life, deflecting a splash of corrosive paint. "This is why I stick to pencil sketches," she muttered.

Wilhelm, already half-machine, stomped forward, his weapons raised as he unleashed hell, "I hate modern art."

Jack, trying to look cool but clearly out of his depth, fumbled with his gun. "Uh, guys? Which end does the shooty part come out of again?"

Timmothy, ever the professional, took aim at a charging PLA member. But before he could pull the trigger, a glob of luminescent paint struck him in the face. "My eyes! It burns... but also kind of tickles?"

In retaliation, Timmothy fired blindly, somehow managing to hit Papa Crust's second-in-command square in the chest with a paint-removing round. The man looked down at his now plain armor in horror. "I'm... boring!" he wailed before fainting.

The battle raged on, a symphony of color and carnage. Papa Crust pirouetted through the chaos, his paint gun leaving abstract death in its wake. "Every revolution needs a signature piece!" he cackled, coating a group of Darksiders in rapidly hardening paint.

Fair Dinkum wasn't going down without a fight. He dual-wielded his pistols with deadly accuracy, each shot punctuated with a colourful expletive. "Eat lead and like it, you colour-blind cretins!"

Alexander watched the madness unfold, his expressionless face betraying no emotion. With calculated precision, he waded into the fray. Each movement was economical, each strike lethal. Enemies fell before him, their life force absorbed into his being.

As the tide of battle turned, Papa Crust found himself face-to-face with Alexander. "Ah, the blank canvas himself!" he declared. "Care to add some colour to your life?"

Alexander's response was swift and decisive. In a blur of motion, he disarmed Papa Crust, the paint gun clattering to the ground. "I prefer monochrome," he said coldly, before delivering a knockout blow.

With their leader down, the PLA's resistance crumbled. Fair Dinkum approached, holstering his smoking pistols. "Well, I'll be a Skag's uncle," he said, eyeing Alexander with newfound respect. "You sure know how to crash a party."

As the dust settled and the paint dried, Alexander surveyed the technicolour battlefield. The Iron Legion's rise was off to a colourful start, but he knew this was just the beginning. Elpis would never be the same, and neither would the galaxy.

Claptrap rolled up, covered in various shades of paint. "So, did I help? I helped, right? Oh, this is so exciting! Do I get a cool title card too?"

Claptrap "Still waiting for that title card" (Any day now...)

As the dust settled on the colourful battlefield, Alexander stood amidst the chaos, his ebony armour now a canvas of paint and blood. Fair Dinkum approached, holstering his pistols with a grimace.

"Well, mate, that was one hell of a show," Fair Dinkum said, spitting out a glob of paint-tinged saliva. "Never thought I'd see the day when Papa Crust's 'art' actually killed someone."

Alexander fixed his pitch-black eyes on the bandit leader. "You mentioned something about the Crisis Scar. I want details."

Fair Dinkum's expression turned serious. "Right, well, it's not the laser itself that's the immediate problem. There's been some strange activity around there. The Redbelly gang's been acting mighty suspicious lately. They've bunkered down near Crisis Scar, and we can't figure out why."

"A jamming signal?" Alexander mused aloud.

"Could be," Fair Dinkum nodded. "Whatever it is, it's got everyone on edge. Feels like something big is brewing."

Alexander turned to his team. "Jack, Athena, - head to Crisis Scar. Investigate the Redbelly gang's activities and neutralize any threat you find."

"What about you?" Athena asked, her hand resting on her shield.

"I have unfinished business here," Alexander replied coldly. "I'll join you soon."

As his team moved out, Alexander turned back to the remaining Darksiders. The tension in the air was palpable, thick with the promise of violence.

"You've been most helpful, Fair Dinkum," Alexander said, his voice eerily calm. "But I'm afraid your usefulness has come to an end."

Fair Dinkum's eyes widened in realization. "Now, wait a minute, mate. We had a deal-"

Before he could finish, Alexander moved with superhuman speed. His hand wrapped around Fair Dinkum's throat, lifting him off the ground effortlessly. Energy crackled around Alexander's form as he began to absorb the life force from the struggling bandit leader.

The other Darksiders, realizing their fate, tried to flee or fight back. But against Alexander's enhanced abilities, they stood no chance. One by one, they fell, their life essence fueling Alexander's power.

As the last Darksider fell, Alexander stood amidst the carnage, his armour now pulsing with absorbed energy. He surveyed the Darksiders' base, now his by right of conquest.

"Claptrap," Alexander called out to the robot hiding behind a nearby rock.

Claptrap rolled out cautiously. "Is... is it over? Are we still in mortal danger? Or just regular danger?"

"I have a task for you," Alexander said. "Find me the communication centre in this base. It's time to send a message."

"Ooh, a message! I love messages! Especially when they're not about my extended warranty," Claptrap exclaimed, rolling off to search the base.

Soon, Alexander stood before a makeshift broadcasting station. The base is an Old Dahl communications tower overrun by Scavenger. Present day it is now run by Alexander. Looking into the top of the communications outpost, he found a Darksider building a satellite.

"Your name," Alexander voiced, his tone cold and demanding.

The flamboyantly dressed man before him flourished dramatically, his colourful coat swirling around him. "Greetings, adventurer! I, Cosmo Wishbone, polymath extraordinaire, require your brutish assistance! I intend to bless this moon with music of my own composition. To do so, on a grand scale, I shall send a satellite into orbit. To this end, I have built a rocket. Almost. Help me complete it and you will become part of my story. Interested?" He asked, his eyes gleaming with misplaced enthusiasm.

"I'm not," Alexander voiced honestly, pushing past the man and observing the self-created rocket and satellite.

The contraption was a hodgepodge of scavenged parts, held together by what looked like chewing gum and optimism. The satellite itself resembled a giant disco ball more than any functional piece of technology.

Cosmo Wishbone scrambled after Alexander, undeterred by the cold reception. "But surely you see the potential! Imagine, if you will, the dulcet tones of my genius raining down upon this savage moon! It will revolutionize the very concept of lunar colonization!"

Alexander turned his pitch-black eyes to Cosmo, his gaze piercing. "Your 'rocket' is a death trap, and your satellite is little more than a tin can with delusions of grandeur."

Cosmo gasped, clutching his chest dramatically. "How dare you! This is a work of art, a symphony in metal and circuitry!"

"It's also exactly what I need," Alexander said, his tone shifting to one of cold calculation. "Cosmo Wishbone, you've just volunteered your services to the Iron Legion."

"I... what?" Cosmo blinked, his bravado faltering for the first time.

Alexander gestured to the rocket. "This contraption of yours, with some modifications, could be useful. Not for your music, but for something far more important."

"But... but my musical revolution!" Cosmo protested weakly.

"Your revolution has been postponed indefinitely," Alexander stated flatly. "You have a new purpose now. You'll use your... unique skills to help the Iron Legion establish orbital control over Elpis."

Cosmo's face cycled through a range of emotions - indignation, fear, and finally, a glimmer of intrigue. "Orbital control, you say? Well, I suppose that does have a certain dramatic flair to it. But what's in it for Cosmo Wishbone?"

Alexander's lips curved in a cold smile. "Survival, for starters. And the chance to be part of something far greater than your musical fantasies. The Iron Legion is reshaping Elpis, Mr. Wishbone. You can either be a part of that future or a footnote in its history."

Cosmo gulped audibly, then straightened his posture, affecting a brave face. "Well then, my brutish friend, it seems Cosmo Wishbone's next great composition shall be in the theatre of war! Lead on, oh iron-clad maestro!"

Alexander turned back to the rocket, his mind already formulating plans. "First, we need to repurpose this satellite. Instead of broadcasting music, it will jam communications and provide us with tactical data. Can you handle that?"

Cosmo nodded eagerly, his fear giving way to excitement. "Oh, indeed! A change of tune, as it were. From symphony to strategy! I shall make this satellite sing a song of conquest!"

As Cosmo began to ramble about frequency modulations and signal strength, Alexander allowed himself a moment of satisfaction. Another piece had fallen into place. The Iron Legion's grip on Elpis was tightening, one unlikely ally at a time.