It was no news to Timothy that things were bad - they'd been bad for a while, he generally categorised frequent near death experiences that way - but it seemed that they were teetering on the precipice of 'truly awful', and his stomach was starting to flip the way it always did when staring down a sudden drop.

It wasn't even the whole business with Elpis, which was clearly coming to a head, it was… Jack.

His boss was an asshole. This was something Timothy accepted, had even made his peace with, because Jack was an asshole who was paying him and that was all that mattered. After Felicity though, Timothy was starting to question a few things.

It wasn't that he thought Jack was evil… egotistical, sure, and ambitious without a doubt… but he was trying to save Elpis, and that was what the good guys did. And he was right, time was starting to run short…

Still, the callousness of it all rubbed him the wrong way. Felicity might have been an AI but she still didn't deserve to die like that… erased, as if she'd never existed at all. She'd been willing to help them, all she wanted was the chance to live…

Timothy could remember her declaring her new name with such open delight. It meant happiness.

But time was ticking ever shorter, lives were at stake, human lives… so he did his best to shove his reservations aside and focus on the job, even as he side-eyed his boss at every opportunity, trying to pick him apart with his eyes.

Then Jack went ahead and airlocked the scientists, and if Timothy's stomach had been squirming at first it was doing barrel rolls now.

He couldn't even think of anything to say. Just, "Oh no."

As if those pathetic words could somehow encomance the enormity of the act. Cold blooded murder. And he hadn't done a thing to stop it.

Jack seemed as stunned as the rest of them, but as he considered the cracked glass of the now empty airlock a smile began to work its way onto his face. "Huh. That felt... Kinda good."

Then he turned away. "Anywho, let's talk."

That was the first time that Jack had genuinely scared him.

Barely an hour later, the girl of his dreams tried to kill him. Or to kill Jack, if you were being technical, but Timothy still wasn't too hot about being collateral. His life well and truely sucked.

If he'd been by himself he probably would have just sat down with his head between his knees and tried to get his hands to stop shaking. But he wasn't alone. He was smack bang in the middle of his rag-tag excuse for a team, with his boss screaming and throwing computer equipment out the window in a fit of rage.

He tried to focus on Athena. She, at least, was reliably steady regardless of what the universe put in her path, shoulders squared and with the stance of a battle hardened soldier. Her attention was on Jack though. Everyone's attention was on Jack.

The man was unravelling, and not gracefully.

There was a time when Timothy used to think he had a pretty good handle on his boss. He'd worked hard to perfect his performance, picked up the swagger, the charm, the careless overconfidence… he wondered why it had taken him so long to realise what it was that lay beneath. Maybe he hadn't wanted to know.

He'd seen Jack shoot the Merrif without batting an eye… but Timothy had shot people who fired on him first plenty of times, so he could hardly take the moral high ground on that one…

And Jack had erased Felicity, but she had been an AI, so maybe that was different… He'd killed Zarpedon while she was talking, but she'd been trying to blow up the moon which kind of meant she deserved it… And Timothy really hadn't had the opportunity to even process the scientists who'd been vented into space…

All just excuses. He should have known. He did, now, but here he was, standing by with no idea what he was supposed to do while Jack ranted and raved about the people who had betrayed him, and there was no mistaking his intent.

Timothy just wanted to go home.

A hand settled on his shoulder, and he startled, but when he glanced over it was only Athena. God, she was probably the only reason he was holding it together at all. Wasn't that pathetic? Days, maybe even weeks running across Elpis, and he knew how to hold a gun with confidence now but the moment things turned to shit he was back to being the same old coward he'd always been.

But… he wasn't alone, at least. Any remaining trust he'd had for Jack might be running dry, but he trusted Athena, and he knew the others would have his back regardless of how hectic things were going to get. And it certainly did seem like things would get hectic, because there was no way they were going to get a break anytime soon.

Jack had finally come down from his tantrum, and his goal was clear - the vault, open and waiting. Timothy only hoped it would be enough to satisfy him, and that Moxxi and the other two had the sense to run while he was distracted. He didn't want to contemplate the alternative.

Timothy had heard tales of the vaults before. He'd never expected to see the inside of one though, and even if he had it wouldn't have prepared him for the strangeness of it. The alien architecture was completely unlike the functional steel structures of Helios, or the rudimentary housing on Elpis, it transcended belief. If it hadn't been filled with monsters he might have taken his time marvelling at every corner.

As it was, the path they cut was swift, and when they reached the rift that would take them to the heart of the vault they only paused to check their ammunition before leaping through.

The fight that followed was the culmination of every moment they'd spent together since Jack called them in.

Wilhelm and his bots kept up airsupport, Athena threw out her shield to block incoming strikes, Timothy used the digi-Jack's to draw the guardian's attention away from everyone, Aurelia whisked up her ice to lock the things limbs down while Nisha bombarded it with bullets… Even Claptrap did its part, stumbling toward almost being helpful for a change. They fought as a team, not the haphazard group of strangers of their beginning but the well oiled machine they were meant to be.

And when it was done, and the once towering behemoth was reduced to a pile of rubble that sank down through the water-like floor into oblivion, they stood battered and breathless, but elated.

Maybe it was just the adrenaline and the crashing relief of still somehow being alive, but for the first time in his existence Timothy felt like he could take on the world. He'd actually killed a vault monster. Actually, honest to god killed one! A couple of months back he would have been jumping at his own shadow, but here he stood, shoulder to shoulder with total badasses, having defeated a creature of legend. He was unstoppable.

Then Jack arrived, strolling calmly through the mess to claim his prize, and he remembered what it had all been for - to help a power hungry psychopath get his hands on alien technology with an unknown potential for devastation. That killed the mood a little.

With it gone there was space for his usual fretful thoughts to return. A wave of 'holy shit I almost died a dozen times' and 'I definitely shouldn't have done that '.

He was still caught up in his own spiralling thoughts as Jack absorbed the secrets of the vault. Maybe if he'd been paying a little more attention he might have intervened… but maybe not.

Lilith punched the vault symbol right through Jack's smug, chiseled jaw, and he did nothing but watch. She was gone before any of them even had the chance to react.

And there was his boss… rolling on the ground as he clutched at the red-hot brand seared into his flesh, shrieking about vengeance and all the fire and brimstone he would rain down upon his enemies… none of the others said anything.

Athena just walked away. She left it to the rest of them to figure out how to get him back to Helios.

The first thing that Jack did when the doctor told him there was no correcting the damage done to his face was to get himself a mask. He chose a design fixed in place with clasps, built of flexible material that would allow his features to still shift and bend with his expression. Something to maintain the illusion of the handsome hero he claimed to be. It was a glaringly obvious fake, even the skin tone was wrong, but it hid his injury completely.

The second thing that Jack did was strangle his own boss to death in his office and steal his position as CEO of Hyperion.

His next moves were practical, decisions to slowly shift Helios and the company it housed toward the vision he had for it.

There was one thing that struck Timothy as odd however.

He'd thought it was a joke at first when Jack told him to go win Moxxi back. Jack didn't laugh though, and Timothy got the sense that if it was a joke, he didn't want to know the punchline.

Maybe Jack really was delusional enough to think that taking control of Hyperion was all he needed to sway Moxxi back to his side… but Timothy knew him and Nisha were already banging (god he wished he didn't), so he doubted Jack had any actual interest in rekindling a relationship.

Perhaps he just wanted the chance to end things on his terms, to get her back to prove that he could, and send her packing so that he got the satisfaction of turning her down. Not Moxxi, bruising his ego by walking away.

Or maybe he just wanted to get close enough that he could lock her up and slowly torture her to death for her betrayal. Timothy wasn't putting a limit on what Jack was capable of these days.

Timothy would have rather been doing anything else, but saying no was a risk he wasn't willing to take, so he didn't argue. Instead he went back to his apartment and stared at himself in the mirror while trying and failing to talk himself up into a state of confidence.

He practiced all the stupid, charming one-liners Jack would probably use, and pulled faces until he'd found one that hit just the perfect level of insufferable arrogance that it felt right.

Sticking to the role while Moxxi was around was always a challenge.

Exactly what it was about her he wasn't sure, except maybe the tits, but also… also there was just something about the way she called him sugar that activated parts of his lizard brain he wasn't proud of. She was beautiful, and clever, and damn sure of herself, and Timothy could never get used to someone like that so much as looking in his direction. She said one sweet thing to him and every one of his thoughts flew right out his mouth before he could stop them.

It was pathetic. Timothy knew it was pathetic.

But all he had to do was walk up to her and spout some nonsense about taking her out to dinner, and she could turn him down, and Timothy could go back to Jack and tell him he'd done his best and life would continue.

He never expected her to say yes.

"You know… maybe everything isn't completely awful."

Athena's expression left him no doubts as to her opinion on that. "It is, Tim."

"Sure, look, everything's a bit of a mess right now but maybe if we just give it some time to settle down-"

"You went out to dinner with Moxxi once," she said. "Literally just dinner. While pretending to be Jack. And now you think things are suddenly all okay? Have you completely lost your mind?"

"I'm just saying things could be worse, alright? Something nice actually happened to me for a change, maybe you could… I don't know, not mock me for it?"

It was times like these where he wondered why she'd even come back to Helios, why she hadn't rinsed her hands of Jack completely that day and disappeared off into the sunset. Maybe she was just waiting to get paid. He hadn't worked up the courage to ask.

When he looked back over at her Athena's mouth was set in a grim line. "I'm trying to be realistic here. You have to have seen the sort of things Jack's planning."

"Yeah but that's…" Timothy tried, "I mean, he's still pretty messed up after the vault business, so maybe if he just has a while to cool his head-"

"You're not fooling anyone."

He really wasn't. It would have been nice, though, to live in a world where he could. Where he could forget about the boss he'd sold his own identity over to impersonate and just play that evening again and again in his mind. Moxxi, with her knowing smile and the way her fingers would trace the rim of her glass like she were caressing it… the way her laugh made him giddy…

To pretend, just for a moment, that there was even the slightest chance she might be interested in him…

But he'd gone along as Jack. And he knew… as much as he regretted to admit to… that the safest place for Moxxi to be was as far away from his boss as physically possible, somewhere he would never see her again.

Jack had already murdered Tassiter and several other Hyperion staff, and the things he had lined up for Pandora… awful didn't even begin to cover it. As much as one glorious evening with the girl of his dreams made him want to hope for a kinder future there was a difference between optimism and idiocy.

"I know," he said, his shoulder slumping. "It's just… is it too much to ask for things to stay good for once?"

Jack killed Claptrap. Destroyed his entire line. Timothy hated Claptrap, everyone did, so by rights he should have been pleased.

He wasn't, though.

Yes the little robot gave him a headache everytime it started talking, and yes he'd always said he wished it was dead, but it tried to help, it tried no matter how frustratingly useless it was, it tried… and Jack fried it without a second thought, and laughed.

All Timothy could think about was Felicity. It left an awful taste in his mouth.

Nisha, Wilhelm and Jack were busy celebrating, but Athena turned away from the sight and met his gaze across the room. He couldn't speak to her about it, not here, not now, but he liked to imagine an understanding passed between them. Silent, but meaningful. Just something to assure him that while everyone else stood around and laughed over the corpse of a fallen comrade, he wasn't the crazy one for feeling just a little bit bad about the whole thing.

Sometimes he thought him and Athena were the last sane people left on the station.

Aurelia was the first one to depart. She waltzed into Jack's office with a whole speech prepared, and marched out with her head held high. Jack pretended not to notice. Timothy suspected he'd still send assassin's after her once he'd had time to brood over the matter in private, but Aurelia had more than enough money to pay off anyone on her tail. Even if she didn't, she was a deadly shot. She would be fine. He liked to think so, anyway.

They might not have been friends, but comrades had to count for something, and he'd… kind of liked how she was never afraid to talk back to Jack. Never bought any of the bullshit he spouted. She said exactly what she thought right to his face, while Timothy just muttered under his breath well out of earshot.

Now it was just the four of them… and of them, only Athena offered any resistance to Jack's increasingly questionable behaviour. He knew there were only two ways that would end, and he wasn't enthusiastic about either.

Maybe some part of him thought that if he just acted as if nothing was happening then everything would be fine. Like if he never admitted his boss was clearly a dangerous psychopath, or that the team he'd spent days running across Elpis with was crumbling apart one member at a time, then he could just carry on like normal. An actor, through and through.

Athena had been right though, he wasn't fooling anyone, least of all himself. He'd seen the sort of plans Jack had lying around his office.

If things had been different maybe he would have been the first to leave… but he had a contract, student loans, and a bomb in his face, and even if he didn't he knew he wasn't suited to life on the run. So instead he did the only thing he could think to do, which was his job. Let himself focus on the performance and try not think about everything else. He wished it helped.

It was night when it happened. Or, as close to night as you could get in space. The internal lighting had been dimmed as it usually was every twelve hours, and the glowing numbers of his bedside clock told him it was 02:44.

Timothy stumbled out of bed, blearily pushing his hair from his face as he went to answer the knocking at his door.

Athena was standing on the other side. She had a bag over her shoulder.

Timothy knew what this meant, but he still said nothing, just stood there and waited for her to speak first despite the awkward way the silence stretched between them. Eventually she seemed to realise he wasn't about to initiate a conversation and leaped in with her own characteristic bluntness.

"I'm leaving," she said.

Timothy nodded slowly. "Do you know where you're gonna go?"

"Not yet." He thought that was all she was going to say, but after a brief hesitation she continued. "Janey says that's half the fun. I… don't really understand what that means."

Ah. Maybe there was some good to be dredged from the whole mess after all, if it brough Athena even an ounce of happiness he wouldn't begrudge her it. He tried to smile, twist his expression into something encouraging. "You two will be good for each other."

"You could come with us."

"I really couldn't."

"You can't stay here, Tim, Jack's-"

He laughed. "You think I don't know that? You think I have a choice?"

"You do."

"Yeah, try telling that to the guy without a bomb in his face. I don't get to walk away." His tone was wry, more bitter than he'd hoped to make it, and who it had even been aimed at he didn't know. Certainly not Athena.

"There has to be a way to deactivate it, you could-"

"Athena, stop," he cut her off, holding up a hand before she got any further. "Look… I'm not you. Even without the bomb, you think Jack would just let me leave? With his ego? He'd hunt me down across the galaxy just so he could make my death slow and painful, and as hilariously anecdotal as possible, and I'm… so not about that. Go. I'll be fine. I've made it this far, haven't I?"

This time his smile was warm, confident, and all the other things he needed it to be. After all, Timothy prided himself in being a good actor.

Athena frowned up at him. Her lips were pursed in a way that made her displeasure clear, but she didn't argue further. Instead she stepped suddenly closer, and Timothy wasn't sure what her intent was. A hug? That would be awkward for both of them.

Then she reached up to grab the collar of his pyjama shirt and haul him lower until their faces were level, and dear god she better not be going for a kiss… But she stopped before they met and held his gaze intently.

"Timothy Lawrence," she said. "That's your name. Not Jack. Don't forget it."

Abruptly she released him, and Timothy straightened up and tried to collect his thoughts.

He cleared his throat, searching for something to say. "Thank you. And, uh… tell Janey I said hi."

"Tell her yourself next time you see us," Athena responded curtly as she turned away. There was no hesitation in her stride, no pause to glance back, she simply adjusted the strap of her bag over her shoulder and walked off down the corridor.

He watched her go, uncertain what feeling it was that stirred in his chest as she vanished round the corner.

"Yeah…" he murmured to the now empty hallway, "yeah, alright."

Jack didn't take Athena's departure well. One person walking away was something he could overlook, but two? That was too much like the start of a trend, and Jack was paranoid enough as it was without questioning the loyalties of his precious vault hunters.

Timothy was pretty sure the only reason he didn't fly into a murderous rage the moment the news reached him was because of Nisha. The woman spent a lot of time with him over the next few days, doting over him, whispering in his ear and finding pleasant little distractions for him like torturing any underperforming staff. She told him it was a good thing Athena was gone, she'd only ever held him back. Timothy didn't think that was a lie.

If there was one thing left that came even close to a conscience for Jack, it had been Athena, Timothy certainly wasn't brave enough to fill her shoes. He kept his head down, followed orders and tried to make himself scarce whenever he wasn't needed. That seemed like the smart thing to do.

A six year contract was starting to feel like a lifetime, but Timothy figured he could take it a day at a time. Then, once it was up, he'd grab the first ship he could find and get the hell out of dodge. Maybe Jack would have found something else to pre-occupy himself with by then, and he wouldn't even notice?

He could find a nice little house on a distant planet where nobody had ever heard of Hyperion, and spend his days writing novels under a pen name and not worrying about student loans. He could get a cat. He could get several cats.

Timothy tried to keep that image in his mind - a life that he built on every time he revisited it - something to tide him through the bad days when a sarcastic inner monologue filled with insults he didn't have the spine for just wasn't enough. It wasn't a plan exactly, but he enjoyed the vagueness of it.

He didn't need to worry about the feasibility of things, could add flower boxes to the circular windows of his fictional cottage and a hot tub in the library, a coffee shop that he would visit daily, details he could switch around whenever the whim took him. He even wrote about it on occasion, stories of another life he might one day lead. While he busied himself with his fantasy, the present felt less threatening. Sometimes he even forgot how precarious his position was.

It was a short-lived luxury.

He hadn't thought much of it when Jack called him to his office that day. About half his orders came in person rather than through his Echo. It could have been a clever way for Jack to limit the risk of anyone tapping the communications channel and figuring out his big plans, but Timothy suspected the man just enjoyed an audience. The chance to whip out one his self-congratulatory speeches, or stand pointedly by the airlock he'd sent the scientists out of and make several less than subtle threats… he liked watching people squirm.

Timothy just resigned himself to the usual song and dance, squared his shoulders, and marched on in.

Jack wasn't sitting in his chair. Instead, he was leaning back against the desk, arms folded and watching the entrance.

"Took you long enough," he said as the metal doors slid closed behind Timothy. "Didn't I give you a watch? That was a thing, right?"

"You did, sir. It makes holographic projections. Doesn't tell the time."

"Really? Man that's some grade-a bullshit. Remind me to fire whoever I had working on that. Anyways, get in here, I've got something for you."

Jack waved him over. Approaching the desk at a leisurely stroll, Timothy hid his caution behind a smile that mirrored the same natural aplomb his boss exuded.

Something felt different, something he couldn't quite put his finger on…

The office was in perfect order. The library was in place on the right, hiding the airlock and the bloodstains at its rim behind a line of shelves. The fireplace crackled away pleasantly. Nobody was dead or pleading for their life. And Jack himself seemed to be in good enough spirits, to the point he'd brushed aside Timothy's tardiness without even mentioning all the awful things that might happen to those who kept him waiting. Everything looked fine.

Yet still, something prickled at his nerves, stiffened the hairs at the nape of his neck and ran cold fingers down his spine.

Timothy decided that this was probably the normal reaction to being in the presence of someone you'd personally witnessed murdering several innocent people, and that he was reading too much into it.

"See, I've been doing some thinking…" Jack said once Timothy had made it to the raised platform his desk was set on. "And this CEO thing? Keeps you on your toes. If it isn't some moron screwing up their division's financial report, it's bandits trying to deface your property, or Maliwan sniffing around for juicy tidbits… and guess who everyone comes to for answers? Me. And hey, I get it, I'm awesome - who wouldn't want advice from Handsome Jack? But it's getting frickin' ridiculous, I don't even have time to drink coffee before someone's knocking on my door because apparently no one here knows what 'self-management' is. You know what else I haven't had time for?"

Finding his mind unhelpfully blank, Timothy grasped for the first thing he could think of. "Uh… pilates?"

"No, genius, I haven't had time for you. So. Here's where we fix that." Jack pushed off from his desk and circled it, taking up a position behind the single yellow chair with his hands curled around the headrest. "Come on, take a seat."

Oh that was pretty much the opposite of what Timothy wanted to do.

He really hoped this wasn't Jack's way of coming on to him. The occasional comments his boss made about his 'gorgeous body' were already deeply uncomfortable in so many ways, and probably considered workplace harassment (not that Timothy was crazy enough to file a complaint with HR). If Jack actually wanted to make a move… well, he wasn't sure what his options were on that front. What was the gentlest way to turn down a egomaniacal murderer with control over an entire mega corperation? Definitely not by mentioning that his heart still belonged to Jack's ex-girlfriend, who had tried to kill him only weeks prior.

Uncertain what move to make he settled for stalling. "But that's your chair."

Jack rolled his eyes. "Is it stating-the-obvious-o'clock? Yes it's my chair, and who are you meant to be? Me. Bravo, glad you could wrap your noggin around that one. Now sit."

He patted the chair, his eyes not leaving Timothy's face.

Reluctantly Timothy did as he was told.

It was surprisingly comfortable, far better than the rigid metal thing that had filled its place in the days before Jack's 'promotion' must have been. The padding had just the right amount of give, plush without sacrificing support.

"How does it feel?" Jack asked, his voice eerily close to Timothy's ear. "To sit at the top? The Hyperion throne?"

"Feels good to be king," he said, in his best approximation of his boss's smarmy tone. It seemed like the sort of thing he'd like. His guess must have been right, because Jack gave a short bark of laughter.

"You bet it does. Go on, relax. You've earned this."

Jack's hands left the headrest, sliding down the chair until they settled on Timothy's arms, guiding them over to the armrests. He didn't fight him.

His pulse was already picking up and so much of the situation felt wrong, weird in ways their interactions had never been before, but he knew how volatile Jack could be. His safest bet, he decided, was to play along. If he was lucky Jack would get bored, or remember the work that supposedly kept him so busy.

This was just a little uncomfortable. That was fine. He'd already had to deal with Nakiyama, so a bit of creep factor was hardly new.

He was doggedly repeating these reassurances in his own head, right up until the moment the restraints popped out of the chair and shackled his wrists.

Timothy stared down at them in shock.

Cold, unyielding metal. His hands flexed, shifting as if to check his eyes did not deceive him.

He knew it was very un-Jack-like, but he couldn't help the faint waiver in his voice. "Uh… Jack, the… the chair-"

"Don't worry about it, pumpkin," he said, patting Timothy's hair before strolling away, "you just sit tight for a minute."

Left in mute agitation, Timothy's gaze followed his boss as he crossed the room.

"Anyways, as I was saying," Jack continued, "this whole CEO business? Got to be everywhere at once or the whole place falls apart. And, then it occurred to me, I can do that! I mean, that's the whole point of a frickin' body double. The Lost Legion is toast and there won't be another vault till Pandora, and here I have you running around doing errands when you could actually be pulling your weight for a change. All we need-"

At that point he disappeared from view around the right side of the office, and Timothy wasted no time giving the restraints a proper test.

Leaning back against the seat as he tried to break free first by merit of strength alone, and then by a more calculated attempt to squeeze his hands through the narrow gap around his wrists. The only thing he succeeded in doing was scoring welts into his flesh as he strained against the metal. Short of breaking bones, he didn't think there was any chance of getting loose. Maybe that was for the best. Jack would probably kill him if he slipped out in the middle of one of his monologues.

Crap, what was he even thinking? He'd already told himself his safest bet was to play along with whatever Jack had planned, kicking up a fuss wouldn't make things any better.

It did nothing to soothe his nerves though.

Maybe the worst part was not being able to see him. Just listen to his amicable tone. Jack could talk in a light and friendly voice while smothering someone to death. Timothy had seen it.

And what was he doing? The right side of his office had still been set up as a library when he'd walked in, but he could still remember in horrific, visceral detail the day Jack had sent the scientists out the airlock. How he'd switched out the fireplace for a console, and with a few hastily typed commands revealed his trap.

Surely he wouldn't airlock Timothy? It was too much of a wasted investment, and besides, he'd done nothing to earn it. Did a psychopath need a reason though?

"-don't know why it took me so long," Jack was saying. "Maybe I just liked keeping that pretty face of yours around. But we've all got to make sacrifices."

Then at last he stepped back into view, and an icy dread pooled inside Timothy's stomach.

He knew what this was about now. He knew.

Held in Jack's gloved hand was the final piece of the puzzle - a long length of metal that ended in a glowing brand. The symbol of the vault.

"No," Timothy said.

"Now now," Jack drawled as he ambled back toward the desk, twirling it as he went, "if you're going to play the role you have to look the part."

"Hell no, I did not sign up for this! You're insane. You're actually fucking insane."

"Language." He wagged a scolding finger in Timothy's direction.

God, the madman was actually enjoying this, wasn't he? Pacing his steps to draw them out, soak in the sight of Timothy's increasingly frantic struggles with the chair.

He simply could not free himself. The restraints at his wrists were impossible to loosen, and even when he tried to take to his feet he couldn't even stretch to his full height, pulled short by their iron grip.

His breaths were coming fast by the time Jack's shoes hit the first stair. When they reached the raised platform the desk was set upon, he abruptly changed tactics.

"Jack, look, you don't need to do this. Y-you said it yourself, right? Why ruin this pretty face? Just give me the mask," he said. "I can wear the mask!"

His boss just shook his head. "Did you listen to anything I just told you? I need you to be me, kiddo, help keep this whole company in line. And we don't half-ass things here."

"But-"

"Ah! No buts." Jack trailed his fingers across the desk as he circled it, prowling ever closer.

Cursing under his breath Timothy made one last desperate bid for freedom as he wrenched himself forward with all his strength. It still wasn't enough. All it granted was pain - sharp, stinging, and sure to bruise.

Then Jack was upon him, shoving him roughly back into the seat and following him down. He threw a knee across Timothy's legs and pressed them still painfully hard before he grasped his neck with his free hand.

Timothy could feel his pulse hammering away against his grip. A thudding, thunderous sound that rushed straight to his head. He thought he would have whimpered, if he could, but no sound would emerge from his open mouth.

His boss's face leered close. It had never occurred to him how truly unsettling that mask was before. Maybe he had just got used to it. But as the waxen, poreless plains of its synthetic flesh loomed only inches away, twisted in a bloodless smile that didn't crease right, he knew this was a sight that would haunt his nightmares for years to come.

The face of a monster - heterochromatic eyes watching him intently as he writhed like a beetle pinned in place.

Abruptly the pressure at his neck abated, and Timothy wheezed in a breath as giddying air flooded his lungs. He choked on it, caught between gasps and sobs.

Jack's hand traced the lines of his cheek almost lovingly. "Got that out of your system now? Cos I'm gonna need you to behave for the next part."

He took another shuddering breath. "D-don't. Please. You don't have to."

It was a pitiful sound, even to his own ears, and Jack remained unmoved.

"Yes I do. I have to know you can take it," he told him. "I have to know you've got what it takes to be Handsome Jack. I have to see it."

The hand that held the brand raised, bringing the heated metal up to his eyeline. Timothy turned his head away. He pressed it into the back of the chair, the leathery material sticking to his clammy skin. His heart was beating so fast he felt it might explode out of his chest.

"Please! Please, I'll do anything you want. Anything! Just don't… d-don't-"

"Shhhh, this will only take a moment."

A rough hand grasped his hair, yanking his head round and holding it in place. He couldn't even focus on Jack. The only thing his eyes wanted to absorb was the glowing shape of the vault symbol that hovered before him. Inch by agonising inch the brand crept closer, and there was nothing he could do.

His legs skidded uselessly against the floor. His wrists were rubbed raw and bloody. He could feel the heat rolling off it as sweat beaded on his face.

Searching for anything to bargain with Timothy was struck by one final, desperate thought.

"T-the bomb!" he cried. "There's-there's a bomb in my face, i-if you-"

"I know what I'm doing. You just keep reeeal still, alright?"

The brand met flesh and Timothy screamed.

Consciousness came in fits and waves. Most of what he remembered was pain. The rest was a blur of voices and light that he couldn't find the will to construe into something tangible, choosing instead to let himself sink back into the merciful oblivion that waited for him.

He didn't know how much time passed.

What he did know was that when he woke in full, he did not find himself lying in medical, but in his own room. It took him several minutes to work up the courage to move, and when he did he only shifted his head slightly to the side so that he could read the clock on his bedside table. Midday. No way to tell the date without finding his ECHO. He didn't have the stomach for that just yet.

His face still felt like it was burning. His left eye saw only darkness. Timothy knew what that meant, but the horror was dulled by the plodding, lethargic pace of his own thoughts. Was he drugged or still in shock? What difference did it make? What difference did anything make? His capacity to care was conspicuously lacking, all he wanted in that moment was to surrender to sleep once more, to let it all fade to black, but no matter what he tried there was no shying away from the present. No running from the steady, throbbing pain that seemed to burrow right through the meat of him until it bit into his very bones.

When his shaking fingers found their way to his face they touched the soft surface of a dressing.

The image of Jack's own visage flared unbidden in his mind - the symbol of the vault scorched in hideous, smouldering welts across his once handsome features. Worse, though, was the memory of the smell… the scent of burning human flesh… not only Jack's now, but his… The hiss and bubble of skin melting beneath heated metal.

Timothy felt sick.

Closing his one functional eye he tried once again to let oblivion take him. Anything to escape the memory. Anything to flee from the desperate, gnawing agony that pawed at his ruined face, left him stiff and drawing in short, shallow breaths to keep from agitating the wound.

But the darkness would not take him.

There was a doctor who visited him sometimes. He didn't wear a nametag, and Timothy didn't ask him who he was. Speaking meant moving his lips, and that only meant more pain.

He would enter a few times a day, change the dressing on Timothy's face and inject him with some kind of medication. Then for a blissful hour or two he would feel nothing at all.

All too soon it would fade though and he would come crashing back to his own body, like the teeth of a trap snapping shut around him, holding him in place no matter how he thrashed.

The doctor brought him food too but it always went untouched.

Timothy didn't eat. He could barely persuade himself to sip water, even the subtle motion of his lips felt like it was scraping the flesh from his face, sending a fresh wave of agony coursing through him. Possibly he would have expired like that, lying in his bed and staring at the ceiling while counting down the hours until his next dose of medication, but after the fourth day even that choice was taken from him.

Nisha straddled him and pinned him down with expert efficiency, gripping his jaw with one hand while she used the other to shovel food down his throat.

"Can't have you starving," she told him sweetly. "Jack spent a lot of money on you."

It would have been kinder if his protests fell on deaf ears, but if anything Nisha seemed to lap them up. Drink in his pain like it was nectar. His tears soaked through the dressing that covered the ruined flesh of his face and stung sharp enough he nearly passed out.

Timothy took the hint after that. He fed himself, choking down small bites regardless of how much it hurt.

The doctor never mentioned the incident and Timothy thought it was better that way. He wondered if Jack would have the man killed after his job was done - punishment for seeing the truth of what lay beneath the mask. He wondered if Jack had killed the doctors who attended to his own injury after Elpis. He'd never thought to check.

Eating regular meals at least had the benefit of filling him with something akin to energy, and he began to leave his bed in favour of pacing the confines of his quarters. Sometimes he would make his way to the bathroom mirror, but he always swerved away at the last second. Sometimes, instead, he would sit at his desk with his ECHO in his hands and stare blankly at the screen.

He never checked the door. The notion of finding it locked was one he'd rather not grapple with. And if it were unlocked… well, Timothy had no idea where he would go.

The wounds to his face were barely beginning to heal when they dragged him back to medical to replace his left eye, and fit him with his own mask. Despite his distaste for surgery, it granted him a few sweet hours of dreamless sleep, and afterward he was doped up on enough pain killers that he completely forgot why the whole thing was supposed to bother him.

He remembered the next day, of course, but by then it was too late to change a thing.

Left with nothing but further time to stew, he braved the mirror.

Why he expected anything else Timothy didn't know, but the face that stared back at him was a perfect replica of Jack - the masked version - all traces of the ruined flesh beneath hidden behind pasty, synthetic skin.

A mask for a mask. His third face, he supposed.

And it hit him, then, the absurdity of it… all that had been done to him for a face no one would even see.

Alone in his room, Timothy laughed, but it was not a joyous sound.

He'd defied Jack once. Just once. At the time it had felt monumental, meaningful, but looking back Timothy could only think how pitifully small the gesture was.

One soldier. One life spared against thousands lost.

But at the time… at the time, he'd only known that he didn't want to pull the trigger. Yes he'd killed people before, because you kind of had to fight back when people were trying to shoot you, but it was different when someone was weaponless and pleading for their life.

He had said, "I'm not you, Jack."

For just a second he'd felt like he had won, somehow, like this was drawing a line. He wished he could have stuck to it. Maybe then it would mean something, and not be his last, childish act of rebellion before he bent the knee like the coward he was.

Jack asked him to jump, and he asked how high… because the alternative was… well, he knew Jack well enough to understand that the alternative wasn't an option. He'd seen first hand what Jack could do to people. He'd had his own face disfigured, felt his own flesh melting away, and that hadn't even been Jack when he was angry. He'd seen what the man could do.

So, Jack asked him to jump, and Timothy asked how high, and he hated himself for it.

It barely registered to him when Nisha and Wilhelm's presence on Helios became a rare occurrence. He supposed at some point he'd stopped caring. He got very good at not caring. In fact, he'd didn't even blinked when the first new bodydouble appeared, just carried on with his job and left it to Jack to fill in the blanks when he decided it was relevant.

The last of the team from Elpis crumbled away, and Timothy was left alone to drown in a sea of chiseled jaws and heterochromatic eyes.

There were bad nights. Nights when he woke sweating and screaming, with bile rising in his throat. And there were nights too when he came back from a particularly bloody job and went to stare at his reflection in the mirror with his hands clasping the bathroom sink until they went numb. Then he would go and stare at his gun, as if he actually had the courage. But he never did.

His life was a fucking joke, and he still wanted to live - maybe that was the biggest joke of all.

He never wrote anymore.

"Which one are you again?"

Jack knew. He was the only goddamned one left on Helios who knew. It was always a game to him though, to keep him on his toes, spark that little voice of doubt in the back of Timothy's head that wondered if he even existed anymore in anything more than concept.

Jack liked to remind people they weren't important. He hadn't even bothered to number the bodydoubles chronologically, or in any system that mattered at all. Just random numbers and letters, just in case they hadn't figured out how little he cared.

Timothy sighed. "21-c."

"Twenty-one… twenty-one…" Jack mused, like he really was struggling to place a memory. Then he snapped his figures and laughed. "Oh, I've got it now! You're the little wimp that cried first time I sent you out on a mission with Nisha."

"Yup. That'd be me," Timothy said miserably. There was no point trying to defend his pride, Jack would only make a game of that too, and attempting to push the blame onto Jack's girlfriend was buying a one way ticket to a very bad time.

"Well, champ, today's your lucky day… Been working on a little side project, a place that could do with a few handsome faces to liven it up. What do you say to a change of scenery, eh?"

"Sure, boss. Gotta share the handsomeness around, am I right?"

"That's the spirit!" Jack slapped a hand on his shoulder in an almost friendly gesture, but it lingered just a little too long, fingers straying to the back of his neck. Timothy kept perfectly still until Jack released him. He'd learned long ago not to flinch. "Anyways, I'm gonna need that watch back before you head out."

Despite himself Timothy tensed. "The watch?"

"Yeah, don't make me repeat myself pumpkin, you'll spoil the moment. Hand it over."

The watch only ever left Timothy's wrist when he showered. Otherwise, it had remained a constant companion since the day he'd put it on, his personal trump card any time a fight got too dicy. One press of a button and he had a pair of digital decoys to lay down cover fire or distract the enemy while he ducked out and patched up his wounds.

Jack had never shown much interest in it before. Why now? Why strip him of his best weapon before he sent him off on a new assignment?

But he couldn't ask. Nor could he refuse, not when it came to Jack. One way or another the man always got what he wanted.

Slowly, Timothy undid the clasp and peeled the watch away. He held it out, letting it drop into Jack's waiting palm while he forced himself to keep his stance relaxed and his expression the perfect shade of nonchalant.

Jack barely glanced at the device before he tucked it away. "Sweet. Now, get your ass down to C-deck, have something there for you before you head out."

That was where medical was housed. A cold dread pooled in his stomach, but Timothy just nodded. "Whatever you say."

Jack replaced his hand. It wasn't even the worst thing to happen to him - he'd already had full body surgery, a bomb implanted in his face, DNA injected into his system, and a red hot brand seared into his flesh. It shouldn't have been a big deal by that point.

But it still hurt like a bitch, and waking up in medical always left him with a powerful nausea that has nothing to do with the medication.

Just another piece of him, gone.

At least the new hand was grafted competently, and it was sophisticated enough tech that he hardly noticed a difference in his motor controls. He couldn't feel it though. It could pick up pressure, but no matter what surface he ran it across there was no texture, no sensation of hot or cold, nothing but the knowledge that there should be.

"I call it my 'winning hand'," Jack told him, with no small amount of pride, "all you schmucks up on the casino are going to have one. Gives you VIP access, the whole package. You'll be living the high life, kiddo, enjoying luxury the Handsome Jack way! Consider it a reward for… I don't know, you done anything useful recently? No? Elpis then, let's say Elpis…"

Timothy was still staring at the hand.

"Well?" Jack asked him. "Can I get a thank you?"

Timothy was tempted not to speak, but he knew better. There was an underlying note of danger in the man's tone, one he'd learned to recognise, and even a hesitation was risky.

He cleared his throat. "Thank you, sir."

"You're damn right! God you people are so ungrateful sometimes… if you didn't look so handsome, I'd airlock the lot of you."

It was only then that the anger hit. A rage that rose too late to have any meaning, bringing with it visions of all the things he wished he'd done. Pictures of him drawing his pistol and sending a bullet cleanly through Jack's insufferable, smug face. Strangling him with his own watch chain. Beating him to death with the nearest blunt instrument.

But as always, the thoughts went nowhere. Timothy Lawrence was a coward, and so he let the fire burn out the same way it inevitably always did and sat in silence while his boss bragged about how much profit his latest venture would churn up.

Just like that, he left Helios behind, shipped out with an accompaniment of fellow doublegangers for Jack's shiny new casino.

Timothy spent the journey staring out the window into the vast emptiness of space. He thought that if he had to describe what he was feeling, it would be something like that view… a nothingness that stretched on for lightyears.

((Meant to get this out a while ago, but I may have got distracted playing No Man's Sky...

I'm considering splitting the next bit into three rather than two? That way I can do the casino before bl3, during bl3, and then one chapter for what happens after.

As always, comments super welcome and appreciated!))