. . . . .


For those who wanted me to continue this; here you go. Another attempt to continue this story. I've killed this story off twice now, this is its third life and this time, I want to take it slow.

I rushed the last two attempts and it caused me to hate it, despite being about my first OC. This time, however, I'm taking my time, putting thought into the story; I'm proud to say, it's alive and kicking.

For old and new readers alike, I bring you-


Alex Rigger: Cyborg Pirate

Chapter 01: Welcome To Pandora


"And what's this other wannabe bandit's name again?"

"Alex Ri-Rigger, Jack."

"Mister Jack, to you. Got it? Call me Jack again and I'll have you neutered and castrated. Anyway, that it? Nothing else, no other alias like these other fellas? What, we got, ah... the Gunzerker—whatever that is; that Assassin freak, speaks in limericks right? No... haiku! That's it. Nothing like that? Nothing special?"

"W-well, yes, Ja-Mister Jack, but why do you care if you don't mind me asking?"

"W-well—quit stuttering, you're making yourself look like an idiot. And I care because I want to know what these morons are capable of. Their special nicknames, or as special as these inbred asswipes think they are, give away their hoo-hah, what makes them unique. Y'know? So? What's his?"

"Whose, s-sir?"

"Oh, my fucking... Rigger! What's he go by, hm? And I swear to—well, I don't know who I swear to, but still—if it's something stupid like 'The Blackheart' or something like that, I'm going to off myself. Not literally, but—you were saying his nickname, doc?"

"The-The Cyborg Pirate, Mister Jack."

"Oh, ohoho! Another cyborg, eh? That's rich. What, does he have a metal leg instead? The other one—Gadget? Gauze... shit, started with a 'g'-"

"G-Gaige."

"Gaige! That's it; man, I am terrible with names. Interrupt me again and I won't just debate the neutering, Hammond. Anyway, she's the one with the arm thing, right? Summons the big ol' robot or whatever."

"Right, sir."

"Oh, look at you! Didn't stutter that time, growing a backbone finally. Good for you. Just don't let it get to your head or I'll have it ripped out. The backbone, I mean. Dammit, getting sidetracked. Read me the rest of his dossier... I want to know this Alex Rigger before we blow him and the other slag chuggers off Pandora."

"Yes-Yes sir."

"Aaaand we're back to square one. Y'know what, fuck it. Just read it to me, be quick about it too."

"Name: Alexander Rigger II...

Occupations: Ex-Pirate, Vault Hunter, Self Proclaimed CL4P-TP Kicker

Known aliases: The Cyborg Pirate, Rigger, Alex

Date of Birth: 14th Nov, 2819

Planet of Origin: Kalam IV, asteroid colony orbiting Kalam

Age: 27

Height: 6'3"

Weight: 179 lbs.

Notable scars and marks: missing right eye (eyepatch concealing wound), large 'W' scarred into back left shoulder (origins and meaning unknown)

Eye color: Blue

Build: Lanky

Complexion: Darkened eyes showing exhaustion, otherwise fair

Personality: Undocumented

Known Ties: Alexander Rigger (Father - Deceased), Unknown Mother (Status unknown - Location unknown) Sally O'Donnell (Wife - Deceased), Scarlett Colleen (Old Cohort - Alive - Last seen in Wurmwater, Pandora), Jamison Fawkes (Old Cohort - Alive - Location unknown), Mako Rutledge (Old Cohort - Alive - Location unknown), Unnamed Ally (Status unknown - Location unknown)

Appearance: Typically seen in his supposed father's brown overcoat, assumedly to cover the scarring on his back. His skin is a light tan, darker on his face. Both limbs on the right half of his being are replaced with cybernetic augmentations (Model number, unknown; make, unknown). Dark grey denim shorts cover his lower half, down to his shins. One boot is worn on his left foot.

Distinguishable features: Earthen Australian accent, common among Kalamian colonists. Cybernetic augmentations.

Preferred weapon: A five-shot revolver he monikered "Sally."

Last Known Location: Hyperion Hyper-Train Station #2558; The Guilded Desert, Pandora...

. . . . .

Vvvvoooommmmm...

The hum of a hyper-train slowed to a dull silence; the vast desert around it and the platform it positioned itself by replied with nothing.

A man tilted his head up from the uncanny nap he'd allowed himself. He pushed away from a low-lit lamppost he was leaning against. Shifting idly for several seconds, he looked around the otherwise empty station before he stared at the train car in front of him with an almost uninterested leer. No one had decided to get off; yet, at least. As he skimmed over his surroundings once more, he came to a silent conclusion, pressing his lips together before taking a step forward. He raised a metallic limb from his waist to grab at a handle on either side of the door's frame-

"Hey."

-but a voice halted him before he could step through the hyper-train's awaiting entrance. He carefully veered his head around to gander at the origin of the new voice; a blue haired female, two sharpened locks of it falling down either side of her face, with similar colored tattoos coating the entirety of her left arm. Her uneven, oddly designed yellow shirt shows a fair bit of skin, of which he quickly noticed with a raised brow. The new arrival stared at him with a lopsided grin. "You getting off?" She asked almost casually as she brought a hand to her hip, her eyes glanced quickly at his extended cybernetic limb.

He nodded once, his own eyes traced the other's arm as well. The tattoos that line it flared a light blue, an almost pulse, before dimming entirely. He snorted quietly to himself before responding. "Nah, love. On. An' you, Siren?" His one eye looked into the recognizably sharp stranger's pair. Silver greys mirrored right back with just as much challenge.

She lets up with a soft chuckle at his response and waved her hand dismissively as if to mean no harm. "Tch, yeah. Why else would I be here, cyborg." She retorted almost sarcastically but continued to grin at the taller man nonetheless. He smirked in response with a shake of his head. His metal arm extended out to her, hand open, in greeting.

"Alex, Alex Rigger." He stated while awaiting her hand to grasp his in return.

He doesn't wait long, the clearly toned arm of the Siren reached out and clasped his gently. Her eyes had gone over him in a quick once-over, her still wary gaze lingered a little at their joint hands before she gave a firm shake. "Maya." Alex's smirk raised at this before he lifted the-now-named Maya's hand to his mouth. His lips pressed against the back of her hand for only a second before he released it.

"Pleasure t'make yer acquaintance, lass." He entertained with a nod, his hand lowered back down to his side. "You be here for the Vault Huntin', too, then, right?" He asked, his head turned to the hyper-train's still ajar opening. As he looked back to her, she'd just finished a simple nod in reply.

She opened her mouth to verbally respond, "TURN AROUND PRETTY LADY!" Yet the voice that sounded in the pair's ears very obviously wasn't hers. The new voice screeched loudly, loud enough to cause both the Siren and the cyborg to turn to it. Neither expected to have to duck as a large buzzsaw flew over them and nearly graze their heads. A squelch sounded not even a second after they did; something warm splattered against Alex's neck when the sound of something tearing, something crunching followed directly after.

As they'd turned around to where the weapon was thrown, how the Hell were they supposed to know this place is all but infested with Rats? Not the literal animal 'rat' that Alex may or may not have been used to on his old ship, but a malnourished, chemmed up human... or, what was once human, at least.

The stranger's large weapon jut from the still standing creature, its death screams forcibly mixed with gags and other squishy noises as the bladed side continued to twirl and spin without any sign of stopping; blood and teeth splashed into the air and over the platform around it. "Oi, now that's fuckin' wrong." Alex piped up from the side, with a disgusted grimace on his face.

Oh, and something from that creature went into Alex's open cavity as well.

Maya rolled her eyes. She quickly locked onto another Rat that descended from the very building she'd previously left to board the train. An SMG constructed into her hands, finger already on the trigger as she fired an uncountable amount of quick bursts into its stomach. The creature's front now riddled with holes, it doubled over onto the cement foundation below, blood pooled beneath. She ignored Alex's sudden cry of "I'm gonna chunder, I-I swear it-oh here it comes," and the noise of hurl escaping one's throat with a shake of her head. As she turned away, she quickly spotted another one and fired at it.

"Oh, bloody Hell! That's disgusting, I didn't expect a fuckin' brain to enter me mouth! Y'just don't expect somethin' like that!" Her fellow Vault Hunter continued to shout as Alex used his still living hand to scrape away whatever matter introduced itself to his tongue. A shadow loomed over him and his vehement tongue wiping slowed to a mere pet. He clamped his mouth shut cautiously and ignored the spongey leftover of whatever; his fleshy hand lowered from it to his belt's holster. He grasped onto the handle of his revolver and sneered quietly.

As he whipped around, the revolver once hidden from the world screamed her name; 'Sally' glistened down the length of her barrel as Alex fired three shots from her into a much-closer-than-he-thought stomach. As the .44 rounds did apparently nothing to the newer arrival, he had little to do besides look up at a man hiding his face with a white-orange gas mask. Intimidated he felt not.

More like damn near frightened.

An audible gulp escaped his throat as the lumbering giant breathed heavily into his mask, grey eyes stare with a torn confusion into Alex's one. "Oh, you're built like a brick house, ain't ya?" He 'calmly' points out, still shaken by the previous possibly-and-preferably-brain-in-mouth situation.

Maya's firing ceased as the last Rat dropped and she turned around to Alex and the-

"Ho-ho-hooly shit, you're hyuuuge!" Maya looked down at his weapon, still protruded from the front of a dead Rat's frontal lobe, and back at the person who threw it. Even with the innuendo there, she's still colored impressed. Alex looked to her with his eye and gave a shaky nod.

"Just went over that, love, but ah... y'know this yobbo? He, ah..." He trailed off as he took a step back from the giant, only for the giant to take a step forward. "He did just save yer ass." She shook her head, ignoring that he'd just glossed over the fact the stranger had saved his ass as well. She approached the two and destructed the SMG from her hands. The quiet giant watched her movements curiously from the corner of his eyes, his main focus still on the one who'd shot him.

Maybe the wrong word was used there... he wasn't exactly quiet, no. More... "YOU ARE THE DREAM MOTHER, THE BEGINNING OF THE END'S BEGINNING!" He bellowed down at Alex and thrust his giant index finger into the smaller man's chest. The cyborg visibly winced and took another step back, an insulted look in his gaze.

"Oi! If anyone's a 'dream mother,' mate, it's you! Standing out like a skag's balls, screaming that shite at the top a'yer lungs!" He would thrust his own finger into the giant's chest, but he didn't want to. Not because he was afraid that the man would harm him or anything like that.

No, definitely not. He doesn't even know what a "dream mother" is.

Maya scoffed at the short confrontation and crossed her arms over her chest. She waited for something to happen; a psycho and a cyborg? Not every day one saw a conversation spark between the two.

The man-beast grunted towards him, raised both of his meaty arms and-

-wrapped them tightly around the lanky man and easily swept him off of his feet. The Siren, seeing this, busted a gut and began to laugh; she had to clamp a hand over her mouth. "Wh-what?!" She gave a muffled snort.

Alex remained still in the hulking man's arms, mind not able to properly grasp the situation. He had shot at the man, the man who certainly looked like he could snap Alex like a twig, the same man who was hugging him... Why... why in the bloody Hell is he huggin' me?! He pondered mentally and tried to pull away from the bigger man's grip. He failed at doing so. "U-uh... mate?" He managed to barely let out, his voice struggled to force itself from his lips as the man's meaty limbs almost crushed his windpipes.

Suddenly, the psycho released Alex from his unbreakable hold. "THE QUEST TO FIND THE DREAM MOTHER IS ACCOMPLISHED, I HAVE EARNED A MILLION EXPERIENCE! YOU WILL LEVEL WITH ME!" He screamed frantically; both Alex and Maya flinched at the blaring tone of his voice. Alex, more so as he was standing just across from the man-monster. A finger in either ear, he shook his head to rid the sudden ringing.

"D'ya have to be so bloody loud! Fuck's sake, me ears!"

"Hey-hey! Keep it down, will you two? Could be more of those things and I just spent one of my last clips on dead-zo back there." Maya hissed, garnering both males' attention. Her thumb pointed over her shoulder at one of the corpses.

Alex raised his hands in defense and gestured his head at the psycho. "Oi, don't go earbashin' on me, love. T'was this bloke who started it." He huffed and lowered Sally back into her home. Maya gave a curious look to her but didn't bring up the question that popped into mind. Her eyes locked on the bigger man who began to move.

The other male stared at Alex for several more seconds and then turned to look at Maya; his cold, psychotic eyes flinched behind his mask. "ONLY THE DEAD CAN SILENCE MY SCREAMS!" He shouted out and stepped past the Siren and the cyborg to retrieve his weapon. His heavy foot planted on the corpse his weapon chose to make love with and he smiled behind his mask. Adjusting it to where his foot was firmly over the dead being's neck, he pulled violently at the buzzsaw; the skull and spine riiiiipped from the body. An audible crunch sounded as the ribs break off from under the flesh. Krieg removed his foot from the corpse and stared at the decapitated head still attached to his blade. He tilted his own before he raised the severed limb along with his weapon above everyone with the one hand. "MY SWORD GETS HEAD!" He clamored and raised his other to grip at the bloodied skull with his off hand. He pulled it seamlessly from his weapon, the head-split wound showed bits of rotted brain and crushed bone fragments before he violently slammed it into the cement at his feet.

Maya noticed, as he began to wipe off the dirtied weapon onto his pant leg, just below his lowermost right ab was a tattoo. Not one anyone would have done, but more or less like barcode of sorts; just a printed set of characters. Bare, for all to see on his stomach, was 'KRIEG-001'. Peculiar. She mused to herself.

Alex winced at the sight of shattered skull shards and shook his head with a low shudder. "Ugh, 'nough a'this mess, I'm gettin' me ass on the train. What a great bloody start to this job a'mine." He let out and pinched the bridge of his nose. He grabbed the handle to the train-car and pulled himself forward; a step over the small gap between the station's floor and into the train itself. "Can' believe I fuckin' puked..." He mumbled under his breath.

Maya turned her head away from the sight on Krieg's stomach to see Alex board the train. "Hey... Krieg?" She tested out, "want to tag along?" She asked even though her attention wasn't just on the psycho, but as well the man who she had just met. Definitely peculiar. She hummed internally, a smile bloomed across her face once more. She sighed out, content with the outcome, and followed after the cyborg.

Krieg's right eye twitched for a second at the sound of his name. As he turned from the corpse, he noticed his two new allies were no longer standing there but were instead gathering in the giant machine. That certainly wouldn't do; not without him, at least. "DO NOT FORGET THE BIGGEST OF DRUMS!" He shouted out and ran up to the train's car door. Instead of entering, he gripped at both of the door's large handles and forcefully closed it with a maddened glint in his eye. "I'LL RIDE TOPSIDE!" He grunted loudly, one hand gripped tightly on the joint handles. Pulling hard enough, he was able to jump onto the roof.

The train howled a loud, horrendous wail; it signaled that it was finally setting off from The Guilded Desert station. Though, it also signaled another thing-

-the start of an epic, bloody adventure.

. . . . .

Were they the first to board this train for its final destination? No, but that doesn't mean they were the last. Upon first boarding, the duo encountered a Pandoran local; a loud, proud, and very sexually frustrated midget with a thick Earthen Hispanic tone was quick to greet the two—namely Maya. Despite introducing himself as Salvadore, he didn't really say much about himself. Granted, he did say he carried a large weapon, but both the Siren and the cyborg declined to see it.

Thankfully.

Oddly enough, the stop after theirs bore fruit to another aspiring Vault Hunter. Immediately on entry, the ex-DAHL soldier saw the duo—now trio—and gave a faux salute. A grin flashed towards Alex sent more than the odd unsavory shiver. Needless to say, Alex promptly ignored him when he introduced himself. Axel or something like that. Probably. Salvadore didn't like the way Maya was looking at him either, so at least the Kalamian felt he wasn't alone on the matter.

He doesn't have anything against gays or bis, he, ah... he just, y'know, doesn't want anything like to be directed towards him. Yeah, that's it.

Definitely.

The next to stops were blank empty spaces that everyone aboard pushed away from their minds. The third after, however, showed quite the interesting person. A man, or what everyone assumed was a man, clad in armor foreign to the other occupants were unfamiliar with. His mask reflected each of their confused—in Alex's case, intrigued—faces and when no one said a word, flashed a ":D" to everyone. "Hello, new allies / I am Zer0, a number / It is a pleasure."

It needn't be said, but no one replied to that.

Though, it did bring up the thought in Alex's mind, where's that big fella? Krieg hasn't been inside since the desert and the cyborg got to wondering where he could be. That is if he even decided to follow them. He wasn't there when Maya asked him to join, it's not like he would know anyway.

Surely, with each stop, both Alex and Maya—who were now seated together so none of the, say, stranger strangers decided to help themselves—had their brows raise considerably. Not only did each new passenger look interesting, they all had their own personal stories to tell. Their looks alone spoke words that their owners hadn't bothered sharing. They could both tell Salvadore was violent, needlessly so, by his intense gaze... at Alex for sitting next to Maya. Axton was a bigger flirt—Alex couldn't stand the constant advances—than he was treasure hungry. Zer0... well, he was a strange man.

"I blend in with them / I am the wolf in sheep's clothes / They suspect nothing."

A very strange man; he was talking to himself.

It was the second to last stop before they would hit Brightmoore, their destination and starting point for Pandora's second Vault, that one of the new occupants caught Alex's eye. Though younger than him, the red-head carried a familiar weight about her, an importance that somehow screamed to the man. That weight was obviously the cybernetic arm she had in place of where a human lefty should be. Of course, it was going to grab his attention.

Setting herself down across the aisle, two seats further from both Alex and Maya, she could easily feel Alex's one eye on her. She didn't mind the attention, she was pretty hot after all, but she did question why he was looking at her. She figured he must've recognized her from her Echo-Cast series. Oh my Gosh, a fan! Okay, play it cool, Gaige. Play it cool. Don't wanna freak out and shoot the guy like you did the last one... Her thoughts calmed her before she could even get excited about meeting another fan. Just, I dunno, pretend to not notice and let him approach or something. Yeah, yeah; that works.

Though, none of that was going through Alex's mind. Certainly not; he leaned his head over to Maya's hair-covered ear and whispered. "Oi, lass. Imma gets meself introduced t'that metal maiden. Save me seat, yeah?" He ignored her idle snoring and got up from his seat. 'Always put your best foot forward', in this case, it was an honest mistake.

As soon as his weighted foot clanked against the metal flooring, the redhead's eyes snapped in his direction.

Even though she appeared to have a disinterested look on her face, internally, she wanted to jump out of her skin. Another cyborg! Oh my Gosh times five hundred thousand! I have a cyborg fan! With her own—and sole—metal limb propped up on an armrest to support her head, she had to clench her teeth to prevent herself from shouting something along the lines of "thanks for the support," or "it's people like you that keep me going," or "let's smash the system together!" Okay, maybe she was a little egotistical since her recent 100,000 subscriber milestone; she didn't notice or anything, but still. Just a little bit.

By the time he was already standing just at the seat next to her, she was once again lost in thought. Mainly about how to go about thanking him and whatnot. As he plopped himself down on to the rough leather seat next to her, she almost did jump out of her skin.

"Oi, lass. Name's Alex Rigger. Great ta-"

"Thank you for smashing that subscribe button! Oh my Gosh, you're a cyborg too, that's so cool. You see, I too, am a woman of culture. Metal arm! Wait, you already knew that, you listen in on me... Oh! So, how's it feel to meet your hero, eh? Must be pretty great, right? Don't worry, I don't bite. Here, lemme sign your arm. Have a permanent marker by any chance?"

Okay, so not almost.

The redhead looked at him in near reverence, her hands balled his opened jacket as she kept him in place. A face-splitting smile formed across her face. This was almost exactly like the last time, but she reckons she doesn't care. Or even notice.

Her nose sniffled cutely and that was the tipping point. Alex reared himself back and pushed the frenzied narcissist away with his own cybernetic limb. "Skag's arse! I was just tryna get yer name, ya damn figjam."

Interrupting his short rave with silence, She raised her actual hand to scratch the back of her neck and her smile shrank into a sheepish one. She sighed. "Oh. Eheh..." She chuckled nervously. In attempt to recover from her undoubtedly embarrassing introduction, she spoke, "sup, the name's Gaige Porter." Her hand extended out; Alex ignored it, to say the least. "Hehe, I deserve that... Sorry, thought you were, y'know, a fan." She replied in a scratchy, yet definitely young, voice; her hand lowered in defeat but stopped abruptly as her look turned inquisitive. "Wait, figjam? The shit's a figjam?"

Alex, his hand now working towards flattening the wrinkles formed by the girl's grip, shook his head with a slight sneer. "Nothin', love. Forget I said it, just a Kalamian thing." At the mention of his original home, the girl tilted her head in further curiosity. Also, excitement. That too.

"Kalamian? You from one of those Kalam colonies? Dude, that's fucking awesome! Oh, wait, I'm so sorry for what happened if you lived on Kalam VII..."

"IV."

"Oh, then screw those guys, am I right? Anyway! I have a friend who has a cousin—no, had a friend who has a cousin who knows my dad that's friends with this other guy's cousin who lived in one of the colonies! We can be, like, related or something!"

"I'm bloody positive that's not how that works."

"Semantics, semantics. What'd you say your name was again?"

"Ale-"

"Oh! So, I noticed you're a cyborg—pretty sure I mentioned that already, somewhere before this conversation—wanna know how I, myself, a woman of culture as well, became one?" She pleaded, and repeated, suddenly; even without Alex's name—and even though he's not a fan, she still wanted to show off her awesome engineering ingenuity. For all he knows, it's just a scrap arm she found on some junker planet.

Not too far from the truth, as she'd got the parts she'd needed from a junker planet, but still.

"I-"

"So, I ended up accidentally cutting myself, right? Not too big a wound, but I didn't have any band-aids. Figured, eh, screw it. I didn't need that arm anyway, it's my off-hand. So, got one of my dad's saws and splurt splurt! Blood went everywhere, my arm was twitching on the ground, mom was screaming, and I'm pretty sure I accidentally killed the house cat when I dropped the saw, but it was fucking awesome!"

"Alri-"

"So, how'd you lose your arm and-and your leg, oh and your eye? Oh! Are you missing your peni-"

"Alright! Ya fuckin' chatterbox, quit yer yabbering, aye? Givin' me a bloody migraine, you." Alex interrupted and placed a hand over her mouth with a glare that meant business. Gaige blinked once before giving a curt nod. Alex raised a brow at her before lowering his hand again and sighed-

"So my arm summons a giant killer robot too, his name's Deathtrap." She started speaking again but at a much calmer rate; Alex raised a brow at this before looking down at his own cybernetic limb.

He wiggled the fingers to it a little before licking his lips once. Well, she did quit yabbering... to an extent. Regardless, he figured he may as well humor the girl. "Yeah, nah, love. Mine's supposed t'be a bloody literal hand-cannon, but can' figure out how the damn thing works." At the mention of this, Gaige's eyes perked up in interest once more. Alex saw this and squinted his one eye at her; she chuckled lightly before taking his hand in hers, bringing it to her face.

Her nose twitched again as she inspected her fellow cyborg's limb, looking for anything that would be defining. A bar-code, a set of numbers, a printing of characters. Anything. She tsked with a smirk as he cast a questioning glance at her. "See this, right here?" She proposed, showing him the underside of his arm; a small print of words was visible beneath scrapes. "You've got a DAHL Scatter-Glove, model 1A. That must mean, to operate this..." She trailed off, running her index finger down his arm to the wrist. "You juuust have to press thi-" Was all she could get out before an explosion another cart over caught her off guard.

Alex ripped his arm away from the girl and stood up almost immediately after the noise, his one eye surveying the remainder of the car before looking to where the sound came from. He stepped across the aisle and smacked Maya on the knee to wake her up. The Siren, previously dozing off, snapped her eyes open the moment Alex had touched her. Maya's eyes motioned to the other occupants and stood up, reconstructing her favored SMG back into her hands before looking at her preferred companion with a slight yawn. "Where's the leak?" She asked, finger itching to pull the trigger on something, anything.

Before Alex could respond, another explosion shook the entire cart and something reduced the wall nearest Gaige into scrapheap. The young woman screamed briefly before raising the hammer that was tied to her waist belt and held it threateningly. Green eyes met grey and both Gaige and Maya faced the newest entry in the car; gun and hammer raised.

Alex, y'know, was trying to rub dust out of his eye.

Everything started when a cylindrical device bounced harmlessly off of the intruder's frame.

Gaige was the first to act, raising the hammer over her shoulder, kicking away the small device that landed at her feet, and she smacked it down onto the mysterious yellow robot's right leg; it, being with her left arm, nearly shattered the mechanism holding the robot's thigh and calf apart. Maya saw her chance. As the machine's attention was immediately diverted to the shorter girl, Maya smirked, firing several bursts into the robot's arm just as itself was about to fire.

The yellow coated robot couldn't anymore, even if it wanted to.

Its arm fell to its side as electricity sparked and wires surged with bursts of energy between the shoulder and the bicep itself. Its attention now on Maya, Gaige took another swing—into its sensory lens. "Ow." The now blinded robot spurted out, stumbling frantically on the machine variation of a bum knee. It swung its left arm violently, randomly in hopes of hitting something, but to no avail.

Alex, having cleared eye and rid the rest of whatever was in it, glowered at the intruding robot; his hand immediately went for Sally, but yet another explosion interrupts him. This time, from behind.

Salvadore didn't know what was going on, all he saw was a robot bust through the wall of the car they were in and that was just enough for him. He smiled brightly, yellowed teeth blaring at the world, and constructed a blood red shotgun in his left hand and a grenade in his right. Throwing the grenade first thing probably wasn't the smartest decision he could've made; it bounced off of the robot and landed next to the small girl, who kicked it away from her and at the wall farthest from them.

Probably wasn't the smartest decision, but why should he care? Still fun. "Ahahaha!" Salvadore laughed out, locked grip on the handle to his shotgun with his left hand and pumping it with his right once before he fired—at the newest robot that came through Salvadore's makeshift entryway. The extra machine failed to register the immediate aggro and it fell off into the chasm the train was passing over, never to be seen again. Probably.

Standing clear of the new entryway, staring down at the falling robot with a whistle, Axton nodded his head with an impressed hum. He turned around and gave a thumbs up to the Pandoran midget before constructing an RPG over his shoulder. Why he thought this was a good idea, hell, even he doesn't know. Alex's attention landed on him and his eye widened when it did. "Don't shoot the damn thing, ya dag! You'll kill the whole lot of us!"

"Right you are, baby! Hooah!" Axton blew a kiss his way before pulling the trigger, firing at yet another mysterious robot that entered the train's car. The rocket soared by Maya, who noticed the miscalculated firing angle. Her arm flared to life as she raised it, stopping the projectile mid-air, and pulsed. The now—correctly aimed—rocket slammed straight into the front of the war machine, sending bits of metal and scrap everywhere.

A piece of the robot's frame slid over to Alex; the words still eligible, read something that caused him to clench his teeth behind closed lips. 'HYPERION Loader #7238'. HYPERION, as in the bloody outfit that hired me... "We've been bloody stiffed!" He shouted out and grabbed for Sally; a robot that had just come through one of the possible entryways faced her full cylinder with no time to react.

"Errorrrrrrorrrorrrorrrr..." The robot fell silent soon after it gave its death throes.

Alex reloaded five more shots into her, spun her cylinder and glanced around for Maya. Alex lifted Sally's barrel to his lips and blew away the smoke that emanated from it; opting to keep her in hand, he caught Maya entering another car along with the others, heading to the front of the train. Maybe the conductor had some answers to the questions they had.

Quickly, Alex followed suit.

. . . . .

It wasn't long before they reached the front end of the train; the door leading to the head tightly shut with Gaige working on the keypad to open it up. Alex turned his head to Maya again and asked her a question. "Where was that big bloody bastard at the 'ole time?" His hand gripped Sally's handle as Gaige tried working through the system's lock. He briefly thought of unloading the rounds he had placed in Sally with five rather unique ones before Maya shook her head.

"Dunno, doesn't matter right now. Unsure if you saw back there, but those were HYPERION Loaders; the damn bastards that hired us, set us up." Dammit, I wanted t'be the bloke t'say it. Alex whined to himself but let her continue. "This is a HYPERION Hyper-train, right? Figured the guy taking us to our deaths might know a little something about that." She growled under her breath, adjusting the SMG against her shoulder as she glared beyond the closed door.

Gaige whispered a loud 'yes!' to herself before standing away from the small console. This, of course, placed Alex's attention on her, more particularly, something he hadn't noticed 'till now; a Loader's wrist cannon was tied to her waist, just next to her hammer. Before anyone, especially Alex, could question it, the door slid open. What was inside the front of the train caused everyone's breath to hitch: a dummy, one that loosely resembled their employer, sat in a swivel chair with both a timer and a motion-triggered ECHO-Log strapped to its chest. The rest of the front was stocked to the brim with explosives; dynamite, boxes of grenades, you name it. Anything with a hint of gunpowder seemed to be stocked away here.

The issue for this rag-tag crew was: they weren't for show.

They were set to blow.

The voice of the dummy, the ECHO-Log strapped firmly to its chest, played. "It's cute how y'all think you're the heroes of this little adventure, but you're not." A man's voice, Handsome Jack's voice—the very man who hired them—reverberated around the car in a perky tone.

Silence was everyone's else's response, but Alex's mouth dropped just as the voice stopped and a little microwave ding sounded; he glared at the mannequin with as much enmity as he could muster. "Ya cheeky cunt." He'd barely managed to say; a blinding light and white noise invaded all of his senses before he could do anything else.

"Welcome to Pandora, kiddos."


Well, what'd you think? It uses my current writing style, how I see Alex now, and I'm expressing more through the characters. The old Gaige was basically just a blank-slate character, but for this, I decided to make her a little more... mmf, wanted to pack a bigger punch with her eccentricity. She even has a last name, as does Maya!

I really want to build out this story this time. It's been four years; at first, I felt I wasn't ready to take on this task, but now, after all I've learned, I think I can.

And I'm gonna try, so, wish me luck.

Anyway, that's that for uh, that, eh? You're all the best and I hope you continue to enjoy!


. . . . .

Alex's metal arm extended out to her, hand open, in greeting.

"Alex, Alex Rigger." He stated while awaiting her hand to grasp his in return.

He doesn't wait long, the clearly toned arm of the Siren reached out and clasped his gently. Her eyes had gone over him in a quick once-over, her still wary gaze lingered a little at their joint hands before she gave a firm shake. "Maya." Alex's smirk raised at this before he lifted the-now-named Maya's hand to his mouth. His lips pressed against the back of her hand for only a second before he released it.

"Pleasure t'make yer acquaintance, lass." He entertained with a nod, his hand lowered back down to his side. "You be here for the Vault Huntin', too, then, right?" He asked, his head turned to the hyper-train's still ajar opening. As he looked back to her, she'd just finished a simple nod in reply.

She opened her mouth to verbally respond, but her face contorted in disgust instead. "Alrigh', who in the Hell opened their lunch? Bloody fuckin' awful, fair dinkum." Her normal tone of voice gone, replaced with Alex's thick accent, the director stood up from his chair in anguish.

"Cut! Dammit! Whoever farted, get the fuck out of here. You're fired! Agh, we were doing so good too... knew it was too well of a first take. From the top, come on people! We have a deadline to hit!"

Alex shook his head waving his hands. "No, I don't think I can do this today, guys. Martha's right, makes me sick to my stomach, whoever ripped one. Could smell it a mile away." He shivered lightly. The director, Handsome Jack himself, shook his head.

"Nope, nuh-uh, not gonna happen Beck. We're not quitting after the first take; put on your accents, follow the scri-"

"Yeah, nah, mate. Dameon, give the bastard a breather, hey? Hell, at least crack a window or somethin'. Ain't too much to nut out, innit." Martha exclaimed, tossing away the smell with a hand, her other crossed over her chest. Dameon grumbled to himself, sitting on his chair before the desert set and nodded.

"Fine, fine. Jason! Go open a window or something; air the place out." He waved away the tallest of the three standing on set. Jason, holding about to throw his buzzsaw—a wire attached to it—sighed and let go of the weapon, letting it dangle in place.

"Yeah, figured it'd be me. It's always me, pick on the new guy... I get it." He threw his large hands up in the air as his nasally voice sounded behind the mask he wore. After he went away and came back with a window open, Dameon ran his hand down his face with a sigh.

This was not how he wanted his first take to fail, he was hoping someone would at least get hurt. A fart? Really? That's what fucked everything up? "Okay, everyone good? You all ready? Don't care. Action!"