"Man, what a job. Who the hell does this kinda shit to their own kid?" he muttered, putting a bit more force into his wrench than usual.

"Hey! Keep your voice down, Pierce." hissed the senior engineer, waving his hand at the junior, "Handsome Jack sees everythin'. And I mean everything."

He couldn't help but roll his eyes. The goggles were good for hiding that; saved him some ass-beatings already. Conversation done, Pierce and his senior engineer went about their business mechanically. Quiet, too. The new, secret Hyperion bots were patrolling - "guarding" was their official purpose, but there's no point to guarding something worthless. Most likely, it really was Handsome Jack keeping tabs on them.

Engineers were dispensable. One wrong move, Pierce and his buddy might be a corpse on the glacier with that fucking CL4P-TP unit. God forbid. But the pay was good, if he survived.

"Oi, Pierce-kid. I'm off to the antechamber. 'parently something 'bout the bioscan is goin' wonky. Idiots needs help."

"Yeah, yeah." he muttered, still shivering at the thought of even his corpse being in the company of that technological nightmare.

Alone in the Angel Chamber with nothing but the Angelic Guards (new bots, all armored and sleek - only the best for the psychotic bastard's little girl) and the sound of his work. Pierce hated the job. Yup. But money . . . so much money, hinging on the gamble that he survived Pandora, that he didn't spend too much on his damn comic book collection, and that he wasn't killed by either bandits or Jack himself.

Risky gamble. He'd taken it anyway. That alone proved he was insane enough to belong on this godforsaken Eridium mine of a planet.

Clank clank clank. What the hell was that? Something in those eridium injectors was rattling about. No slaggy shit running through right then, but it might burst. And then Jack'd have his head.

Clank clank clank. It was annoying, too.

"He does see everything, you know."

Clank clank clank. Had to fix that.

"Um . . . it's a good thing I used my phaseshift to erase all that."

Phaseshift. Something familiar about that. Clank clank clank. Damn place. It was so messed up.

"Uh . . . hello?"

He glanced back briefly. Chick with blue tattoos, half-shaved head, all innocent looking. Looking at him. Clank clank clank. Back to work, because that sound would be in his nightmares if he didn't fix it. And he had to work; work and work and work and then get off this stupid planet. Hopefully Niko'd take his unfinished comic book collection, because he sure as hell wasn't taking it with him- Clank clank clank.

"Uh-"

Clank clank clank.

"AAAAHHHH! I hate that sound, I hate it, I hate it, I hate it. Stupid Hyperion, stupid chamber, stupid Jack-"

"Are you going crazy?"

"No, what? Well, maybe - this is Pandora, after all- wait. Who the hell-"

He turned back to the girl with blue tattoos. She was giving him one of those looks. Like 'you're an idiot' or 'wow I can't even believe how stupid you are'. Something along those lines. Pierce didn't really have a lot of experience with the opposite sex. Didn't help that there were no freakin' girls on Pandora, either.

"Hi. You . . . seem a little disturbed." the girl said, looking at Pierce like he was crazy.

He didn't blame her. He blamed the damn-

Clank clank clank.

"GAH! Whoever you are, just gimme a bit, I need to fix this-"

"According to the blueprints, it's in the exterior rings. Your, um, associate didn't secure it to the interior frames correctly." she fired off in one breath.

Pierce felt guilty, later, that he'd subjected a young girl to almost all of the cuss words in the universe. But mostly he felt relieved that the continuous, monotonous clank was silenced. In fact, the entire chamber was silent; only a relieved-but-guilty engineer and a curious-but-intimidated Siren.

"You are a Siren, right?" he asked.

She nodded, a little smile on her face. Amused, it looked. "One of six."

"Well, yeah. I figured." Pierce muttered, tossing his toolbox over his shoulder and letting his legs dangle off the walkway.

The Siren slowly approached him and crouched down next to him, thin arms hugging her knees to her chest. She was looking at him curiously, like she was expecting something. He wasn't sure what.

"Uh. Okay. I'm gonna assume you're a hallucination." he said. Wouldn't be the first. Though, it would depress Pierce a bit - hallucinations were in the beginning stages of the skull shivers, and with all the eridium around he wouldn't be that surprised . . .

But she shook her head. "I'm Angel."

It clicked immediately. "Handsome Jack's kid? You're Angel?"

She smiled a little. "Yes."

Pierce frowned. "Well. Okay. I'm not gonna ask anymore - I don't wanna know. But hey, thanks. For erasing the shit I said about Hyperion. I probably would've been killed, huh?"

Angel gave him another strange smile. "Maybe. My dad . . . well, he's my dad, but he's ruthless. His only weakness would be me, I suppose. Enough that the security is lax enough for me to sneak into my new room."

Pierce glanced around. Angelic guards were gone - the Siren probably sent them away. But aside from that, it was huge and drafty, defenses hidden underneath sleek design and the injectors half-opened. Her new room? It looked like a prison. Or a cage.

For lab rats.

He shook his head. "Not too cozy, Siren. Not at all."

Angel gave a little laugh at him. "No, it's not. But this place will protect me while I-"

Pierce gave her a pointed look. "I don't wanna know."

She nodded, shutting up. "Yes. Um . . ."

Well, now he felt bad. Handsome Jack's kid or not, Siren or not, Angel looked a bit pitiful. He was building her a cage, commissioned by her pops. Kinda depressing. Plus, he wasn't interested in learning too much - or at least, anything that would probably get him killed. Nope. Life before all else, really.

But still. She was just a girl.

"Yo, Siren. Check this out." he motioned to her, digging back behind him, where he'd crammed some of his comics into his pants. "How many comics d'you think I've got down here?"

She looked at him like he was crazy. He probably was - Pandora and all. "Um. Why do you want me to answer that?"

"Guess." he said, grinning, "C'mon, I'm bored."

Angel smiled quizzically. "Three?"

"BZZT! I've got a grand total of seventeen!" he said, piling the frayed pages between them, "You'd be surprised how much I can stuff down in these work pants. And now, we're gonna read."

She frowned. "Those were just down your pants."

"Hey, I keep it clean down there. Don't worry about that." he said, shrugging, "Now, you're gonna read so I got someone to talk about SuperSiren and The Mystic with. You've got free time, obviously."

Angel looked a little surprised. "Why are you-?"

"C'mon, think of it as a favor." he said, pointing at the first issue in all his stained, dog-eared glory, "Read 'em and I'll be your frieeeeennnd . . ."

The Siren blinked at that, and then grinned. "I've always wanted a friend."

"No kidding. Now pick up the comic and read," he ordered, pushing it into her tattooed hand, "friend."