"You mean there's another Siren out there?!" Lilith was practically ablaze with excitement. She had come to Pandora in hopes of meeting more badass bitches like herself - that is to say, Sirens - but the only one she had met so far died a minute after Lilith first laid eyes on her. Bam, bitch.

"Yeah, and she's a feisty one. You'll like her," Roland responded. "I need you to get her on our side, we could use another Siren right about now."

"Sure. Give me her echo."

The skies turned black and Maya smiled. Evil descended upon her face, her irises faded into her illuminated scleras. Four portals opened up from another world, another time. Purple lighting shot out from each of them as they danced around in the sky, killing the hordes of bandits below. Krieg stopped cold in his tracks. "No, Princess, not like this," his inner voice whispered. Maya was possessed. Rage filled his soul, liquid nitrogen shot through his veins, leaving goosebumps all over his body. "NO! DON'T DO IT!"

His heart pounded and his mind raced. All he could think about was KILL KILL KILL EVERYTHING MUST DIE IT'S A BLUE LIGHT SPECIAL ON PAIN! His nerves were numbed, his feet, quickened. He felt invincible. Nothing could stop him. This is how he wanted to feel for the rest of his life. His ears tingled like they were on fire. It felt so good. He could hear the voices of the angels, so far away. "You must save her," they said. "You must save her from…." But his 15 seconds were up.

"Uh, hello. My name is Lilith and, uh, welcome to the Crimson Raiders because there is no other option for you. You. Are. AWESOME."

Maya let her bitch resting face do all the talking. She knew they'd come crawling back.

Krieg, however, had important things to say. "I'M HERE TO SHANK AND SMILE!"

"Ah," Lilith smiled, "You must be the psycho. I've heard good things."

"Is he going to be a problem with Roland? Because Krieg and I are a package deal," Maya felt her temperature spike.

"Let me handle Roland. Hell, I'll just show him the footage from this Echo. Come on over to Sanctuary. I'll tell Scooter to put you into the Catch-a-Ride system."

Maya and Krieg located the CaR. Krieg excitedly started mashing buttons, and in no time, a yellow runner had digistructed before their eyes. "Hop in, I'm driving," Maya commanded. They made it to Sanctuary in record time; Krieg vowed that he would be the driver from now on. Maya saw the terrified look in his eye and knew that they'd be fighting over driving privileges in the future.

"Hey kiddo, Handsome Jack here," a smooth voice came over the intercom. "Looks like you not only managed to escaped but you also - oh man, this is rich -" he paused to laugh, "joined the Crimson Raiders. Well congratulations. Have fun that. Really. I'll be sending my men to retrieve you in… now."

Hyperion Loaders began digistructing before their eyes, while Engineers deployed from Buzzards in the sky above.

'SOMEBODY DELIVERED A FEAST!" Krieg yelled out, making his rounds with his buzzaxe. Maya was surprised at how efficiently he was plowing through the Hyperion tech with his weapon, and how unfazed he seemed when an EXP Loader blew up right next to him. She pulled out her caustic SMG and got to work. It was all rather boring, really; the Hyperion fleet was wiped out easily.

"Ten years of Dahl military experience at your… service."

Maya and Krieg looked over. The gates of Sanctuary opened, and out walked "Axton. Thought I'd come help you two out with Jack's little welcome to the Raiders present. Looks like I was late." He gave Maya an appreciative once-over. Maya smirked. Wasn't anything she didn't expect. Axton then turned his attention Krieg, giving him the same appreciative once-over. "Wow, do you work out, or…"

Axton lead the duo to the Command Center. Maya's eyes darted from one building to the next. Sanctuary might not have been the cleanest town she'd ever seen, but it was certainly better than where she currently called home. Smelled nicer, too.

"Wanna meet my girlfriend?" Axton asked, with a smile.

"Uh, sure, why not?" Maya agreed.

A shapely young woman was hunched over a table to the right inside of the Command Center. She was mumbling something incoherently, scrawling down plans on the back of a used envelope. Her short, raven-colored hair set off mesmerizing emerald eyes. Maya felt a small pang of jealousy, but dismissed it quickly. She found herself staring into this strange lady's eyes, but found no light behind them.

"Your hair looks delicious, like candy." she said to Maya, eyes suddenly filled with wonder.

Axton cut in between the two. "This is my lady friend, Patti."

"Do NOT call me that. I am Dr. Patricia Tannis, and you will address me as such." She nodded her head once as if to seal the deal. It was now law. Maya watched as she bobbed around the room from one thing to the next, like a crazy, dark little pixie. She decided that she liked Dr. Patricia Tannis. There was plenty of crazy in this world, herself included. Patricia seemed like the fun kind.

Krieg made himself at home and plopped down onto a chair. Dr. Patricia Tannis gasped. "Do NOT sit on Phillipe!" Krieg got up immediately. "Now you've done it.," the voice echoed in his head. "You probably just killed a gerbil or a cat or some other sort of house pet." He turned around to see what he had sat on, but found nothing but a chair. His hands scanned his backside rapidly. No carnage there. Slowly, he cocked his head to the side and looked at Tannis. Had she been able to see all of his face, she would have known he was giving her the stank eye. Instead, it just looked like his one "available" eye was open really wide. Tannis launched into a rant about how Phillipé - the CHAIR - was a delicate, but brave, beautiful soul, and how they had first met at a bar a few years back. Krieg had stopped listening. He let all of his weight drop down onto "Phillipe," enjoying the satisfying feeling that met his tailbone as the chair collapsed down to the floor. "WHAT A BEAUTIFUL SYMPHONY!" he said of the crunching sound. Tannis's mouth opened, but no sound came out. Everything holding her together seemed to vacate her body at that exact moment, leaving just a shell of her former self. Krieg knew he had messed up. He didn't realize it wasn't a joke, that Phillipe was… more than a chair? The idea still didn't make sense to him, but the look on her face, the way that her body hung there, just dangling in the air, moments from collapse; he knew that look, he understood that pain. Every time he had to say goodbye to her, every time he wanted to kiss her, but he couldn't, every time he wanted to hold her, and make love to her, but he didn't because he knew that if he did…

The world turned red right before his eyes. He had the urge to kill. He wanted to kill everyone in the room, in this town. He wanted to kill Tannis and Axton and he wanted to take Maya and run away and never have contact with anyone else ever again. They would do whatever they wanted, and they would die together, would that be so bad? "You could never hurt an innocent person," a voice from his past reminded him. It was her. Her voice was so soothing, so beautiful, but so different from how it sounded now. "I NEED YOUR HELP!" he growled at her, unintentionally. "She needs yours." Everything turned blacked.

"I am so sorry. I swear, I will buy you a new chair."

"You don't understand what you've done!"

"… IT'S A FREAKIN' CHAIR!"

Krieg heard Maya and Tannis bickering, so far away. He was glad he wasn't the only one who didn't understand what was going on with that chair. Phillipé. So pretentious. Shut up, it's a fucking chair.

"Good morning, sleepyhead." Maya's smiling face was hanging upside down from the bunk above him. He jolted awake, his head clashing against the cold metal bed frame supporting Maya's mattress. "Careful," she giggled. He laid back down and stretched, pushing his palms into his skull, shifting his mask ever so slightly. Maya moved in to catch a glimpse of something, anything… Krieg watched her fall straight to the floor. He leaned over to see if she was okay, his face positioned just over hers. The emotions from last night rose to the surface. Lust, joy, lips, lips, so soft, kiss her. GO AWAY. Why did it have to be like this? She rolled away in a huff. She must have felt it, too.

"You hungry?"

Always.

Maya headed outside. Krieg followed excitedly. It was feeding time. He inhaled sharply. The sweet smell of meat tickled his nose hairs. "MEEEEAT," he cried out. He suddenly found himself at a döner stand, his eyes were wide with anticipation. "Two döners and a red fizzy, please," Maya said, pushing exact change across the counter. Krieg was concerned. Two wasn't going to be enough to fill him up, and what was Maya going to eat? "And, how much for that thing?" Maya pointed to the huge rotating spit behind the cook. Krieg's mouth watered.

"You want that entire rack of beef? That's enough to make, like, a hunnerd kebabs, lady!"

"How much?" One good thing about drifting through time over thousands of years? You amass quite a bit of money. Maya and Krieg walked away happily. She didn't think she'd actually be able to convince him to sell it to her. Maya sat backwards on one of the picnic table benches so that Krieg could easily sit next to her. The bench tipped over instantly. Maya laughed. She didn't want him to feel badly, so whenever things like this happened, which were often, she always made sure to laugh. "My bad, I wasn't thinking," she apologized. "Let's sit on the grass instead."

They found a small patch of dead looking grass. It was mostly just dust and dirt. It was nice, though. Almost felt like home. So long ago, back when they first met, Maya — of course, she wasn't called Maya back then — and Krieg would have lunches on the side of a mountain near the small farm town where he lived. It was so beautiful back then. Maya leaned her head on Krieg's shoulder and started to cry softly. She tried to contain her sniffles and sighs, quickly resorting to holding her breath. Krieg was paralyzed. "Hold her, Meathead." Krieg put his arm around her, puzzled as to what he needed to do next. "Tell her everything is going to be okay," his inner voice said as calmly as possible. "I WILL KILL EVERYTHING FOR THE HONOR OF MY QUEEN!" Maya collapsed into him. Normally, his psychotic rants made her smile, but this one held so much meaning. Why had she done this to him?

She stood up straight and looked him dead in the eye. "Do you ever hate me for what I've done to you?" she spat out all at once. "I mean, not, this," she gestured with her hands at monster he'd become, a mere shadow of the once valiant hero he was before, "but… everything?" He didn't answer. It wasn't something he had ever thought about. Every moment he was fighting, he was hurting, he was suffering, he was doing so for her, to spend another minute with her, to make life better for her, to be worthy of her, to maybe one day have an actual chance with her. "I don't know why I expect you to answer me."

"Say something to her," his inner voice begged. "Tell her that you love her, that you'd do anything for just a moment of her time…." the voice trailed off, knowing better than to make serious demands of such a simple, twisted mind. The words faded away into the ether. Krieg watched as each speck of each letter dissolved into nothing but pure black. Crisis averted. He had to do something, anything, to show her that he cared. Small steps. Closer. Closer. Stopstopstopstop, watch her feet. Such delicate feet. He let his body curve down toward her, slowly, his head resting against hers. His mind began to fog. The fragrant smell of the forest filled his nostrils. It was spring time, back then. Man, how long has it been since we've seen anything we could refer to as "Spring?" The land was so young. Everything was brand new, including their love.

"HEY!" Maya cut through his daydream. "Listen, we should get going. Gotta find out where Roland is. Apparently, he's gone missing."