Jay wasn't sure how long the silence lasted after Angel's voice vanished—but the weight of it clung to him. Lilith kept glancing his way, as if trying to read something in his expression, while Claptrap hummed the opening notes of a tune that was definitely off‑key and absolutely unwelcome.
Cortana finally broke the tension. "We should keep moving. Whoever she is, she clearly has access to long-range communication systems. That alone makes her a threat—or an ally we need to understand."
"Yeah," Jay muttered. "close enough."
Lilith shoved her hands into her pockets and started walking toward the next stretch of Fyrestone's uneven streets. "Well, mystery lady or not, we've still got work to do. This place is a dump, but it's our dump today."
Claptrap beeped happily. "YES! AND AS YOUR MANDATED MORAL SUPPORT UNIT, I WILL PROVIDE—MORALE!"
Jay sighed. "I regret ever coming near you."
"I DO NOT!"
Fyrestone wasn't large, but it was messy. The kind of messy that implied years of bandit raids, scavenger wars, and the occasional explosion-based disagreement.
Jay and Lilith split up to handle the stragglers still hiding behind shacks or attempting ill-planned ambushes. Most of them went down fast.
Jay blinked across the rooftops, testing the limits of his stamina. Each teleport left a faint shimmer in the air and a sharp pull at the base of his spine.
One raider tried to lob a grenade at him. Jay absorbed the explosive just before detonation, the Ruin Engine sucking the entire object into its inner storage with a pop.
Cortana whistled inside his Echo. "That could've gone badly."
"Yeah," Jay agreed, exhaling. "Let's save the self-destructing fireworks for someone else."
Meanwhile, Lilith was tearing through her own cluster of bandits. Phasing, flickering, combusting—she fought like a dancer with a grudge. Jay paused to watch her finish off the last two, her hair glowing faintly with residual energy.
She caught him staring. "What? Never seen a Siren work before?"
"Not like that," Jay admitted.
Lilith smirked. "Stick around. You'll see plenty."
When they regrouped outside Zed's shack, the old doctor stepped out to greet them again—holding what looked like a blood-soaked wrench.
"Oh, good! You're still alive," Zed said, waving the wrench vaguely. "Bad morning for the neighbors. Something about a raider infestation. You probably noticed."
Jay gestured toward the courtyard filled with unconscious bodies. "We took care of it."
"Marvelous!" Zed clapped his hands. "Then I suppose you'll want access to the bounty board."
Lilith blinked. "The what?"
Zed pointed at a rusted metal terminal barely clinging to the wall of his clinic. "That thing. Gives out jobs. Gives out money. Sometimes gives out explosions if you press the wrong button. Don't press the wrong button."
Jay approached it cautiously.
Cortana murmured, "I'm scanning… terminals like this existed in the source material you mentioned, right?"
"Yeah," Jay said quietly. "This is how side missions start."
Lilith leaned over his shoulder. "What do we got?"
The screen flickered to life:
Homeless helper – Repair Claptrap's station.
By the Seed of Your Pants – Destroy nearby bandit threat.
Nine-Toes: Take Him Down – LOCKED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE.
Lilith grinned. "Looks like we've got options."
Jay groaned. "Fixing Claptrap's station means more Claptrap."
Cortana snorted. "Character growth opportunity: tolerance of mechanical suffering."
"Ha. Ha."
The repair job wasn't complicated—just annoying.
Claptrap guided them to the broken power station with an endless stream of narration.
"THIS IS MY HOME!" Claptrap declared proudly.
"It's a metal box," Jay muttered.
"A VERY FUNCTIONAL BOX!"
Jay crouched beside the ruined circuitry. The wiring looked like someone had attempted repairs with a blowtorch and bad decisions.
"Can you fix it?" Lilith asked.
"Yeah," Jay said—and then let the Ruin Engine pull in the scattered components, melted metal, and broken screws. It separated them internally until only polished, functional parts remained.
He pressed his palms to the framework and let the refined materials flow outward. The structure rebuilt itself like a mechanical jigsaw puzzle completing in reverse.
Claptrap gasped loudly. "BEAUTIFUL! YOU ARE A MASTER OF THE MECHANICAL ARTS!"
Cortana chimed, "Correction: he is barely qualified for basic maintenance. The Engine is doing the heavy lifting."
"Let me have my moment," Jay muttered.
The station hummed to life.
Lilith looked impressed. "Okay… that was cool."
Jay shrugged, trying not to look smug. "One of the easier tricks."
Clearing the Last of the Raiders
With the station fixed, Claptrap led them to another area outside Fyrestone—where several bandits had regrouped.
Jay and Lilith fought in tandem this time.
Jay blinked in close, redirecting gunfire through improvised shields, absorbing stray bullets into the Ruin Engine where they dissolved into raw metal. Lilith phased directly through enemies, igniting them in bursts of elemental fire.
At one point Jay caught a bullet in the calf—nothing major, just enough to make him stagger.
Lilith caught him by the shoulder. "You good?"
"Yeah," Jay grunted. "I can handle it. worse case I can see if zed is up to snuff."
She nodded and turned back to the next raider.
The fight was short, loud, and ended with a small explosion that definitely wasn't Jay's fault. Probably.
Cortana hummed. "Area secure. Again."
"Good," Jay muttered. "Maybe now Fyrestone can breathe."
Lilith looked around the empty lot. "Doesn't look like much of a breath to me."
"It's Pandora," Jay said. "This is breathing."
Lilith's Questions
They returned to Fyrestone's center with the sun dipping low—though on Pandora, that didn't mean much. The sky was a swirling mess of burnt orange and dusty clouds.
Jay was checking his weapons when Lilith stepped beside him, arms folded.
"So," she began casually, "you gonna tell me what that teleporting trick is? Or how you make metal shields out of sand and garbage?"
Jay hesitated.
Cortana interrupts. "Careful."
He sighed. "It's… complicated. Some of it I just picked up recently. Some of it I can't explain yet. Not safely."
Lilith studied him for a moment. "Is it dangerous?"
"To me? Yeah. To others? Definitely."
She nodded slowly. "Alright. I won't press. For now."
Jay exhaled in relief.
Lilith smirked. "But I will eventually. Don't think you're off the hook."
"Figured as much."
As Jay turned to head toward Zed's for their payout, the strange chime returned.
Jay froze.
Lilith paused. "What now?"
The voice that slipped through was softer this time.
"Good work," Angel whispered. "Your progress benefits us all. But be careful—the path ahead is dark."
Jay swallowed.
Cortana whispered urgently, "She's monitoring your signal. She's watching you, Jay—not Lilith, not the town. You."
Angel continued: "I'll be in touch again soon."
Then silence.
Lilith frowned. "There she goes again. Whoever she is."
Jay forced a shrug. "Let's just collect our reward."
But privately he felt the scrutiny, the invisible gaze.
And he didn't like it.