Tex’s next stop: the Armory.
Havoc’s domain.
He typed in her usual override code. No resistance. The door opened with a reluctant hiss, servos groaning like they hadn’t been cycled in decades.
He stepped inside.
The space was cavernous—vaulted ceilings disappearing into shadow, gantries crisscrossing overhead like steel ribcages. A massive central platform dominated the chamber, surrounded by rails that spiraled upward toward the Ark’s highest point.
At the top: a sealed blast door.
At the center: Havoc.
The ancient bomber morph sat hunched on the platform, a rusted bomb cradled in her lap like a sacred object. Her oversized hands—pitted, dented, scorched—moved slowly over its shell with a cloth, polishing it with mechanical reverence.
Her nose glass was cracked. Her plating worn to the base alloy in patches. But her yellow optics flickered to life as he entered, casting twin beams like searchlights into the dimness.
Tex braced himself.
Then came the voice—slow, warm, and unshakably kind.
“There you are… I was wondering when you'd stop by for tea.”
She didn’t rise.
Just continued polishing.
“Looking for munitions?” she asked, tilting her head toward a row of long-disarmed bombs. “Some of my babies are still live… but most are quiet now.”
She nodded, almost sagely.
“I’m sure Helga knows what’s best.”
Tex squinted slightly, scanning the racks. Most of them were inert. Some… definitely weren’t.
“Right… you’ve changed,” he said carefully. “You feeling alright? How long’s it been since you were on mission?”
She looked up, her lenses flickering faintly—like a VHS tape trying to focus.
“How long has it been?” she asked aloud, almost to herself. “Five... maybe six years?”
She smiled, the metal of her cheeks creaking softly.
“Not often someone stops by to visit.”
A part of him felt sorry for her. Sure... she was massive, even seated, making him feel incomprehensibly small.
He slowly made his way forward, just taking a seat across from her, It.. was like she was just a grandmother the world was passing by, letting her rust in solitude. This... this was cruel. This wasn't something Havoc deserved, wasting away in solitude.
"Havoc? When they made you... what was it like back then?"
She let out a quiet chuckle, a puff of dust leaving her jagged maw as she gave a crooked smile, "I was just a little girl back then.... I had been working in the factories making the bombers when I lost my legs in a work accident. Next thing I knew, I was being told by soldiers to sign some forms, and next thing I knew, I was wheeled into surgery. When I came out... I was this... When was that? The summer of '44? I think... or was it '43? The years kind of roll together these days." She says softly, giving him a smile as she adds,
"We were fighting the Bloc off in Britain back then... terrible days... The Reds came across the Pas Di Callais, and landed a few weeks after I was commissioned. The missions were.... they were tough back then. But we were fighting Trotskyism.... so.... we did our part." She explained with a weak smile.
"It was about around the Battle of Manchester in '46 when we started dropping the dirty stuff to stop the Reds. I remember those raids well. I remember how cold it was up there. I had icing warnings that entire winter. I remember watching the Reds chasing bombers upward, just so they'd freeze up and drop like rocks. It was.... tough."
Tex didn’t speak right away.
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He just watched her. Watched the way her plating flexed when she breathed, how her fingers paused on the bomb like she was cradling a memory.
He realized it wasn’t a weapon anymore.
It was a headstone.
“They called us angels of judgment,” she said after a moment. “But I always thought we were more like ravens. Black wings, loud mouths, always circling the dead.”
She looked down at the warhead in her lap, brushed a thumb over the faded yield stencil.
“Never thought I’d outlive everyone. Never thought I’d be polishing this instead of dropping it.”
Tex leaned forward, voice low.
“Do you regret it?”
She didn’t answer right away.
Instead, she gently rotated the bomb in her lap. It creaked like a coffin lid.
“You don’t regret breathing,” she said. “Even when it hurts.”
She sighed heavily, her body sagging slightly as She said,
"This world isn't meant for me anymore, Tex.... Not for people like me.... this is your world now. I hope you can do better than we did." She said with a heavy sigh
"You are the inheritors of people who let hate win... Besides that, there are no winners in war."
She looks up at him, eyes shining like some massive grim reaper as she says, "I have... one request... I just want to see the sun.. one last time." She says quietly.
Tex was stunned. She... she wasn't serious, was she? "Havoc..." He started
“Susan… Susan Durant. That’s who I was. Before they put me in here.”
She looked up then, and Tex swore—for just a moment—he wasn’t looking at a morph.
He was looking at a woman.
She clutched that bomb to her just a bit more tightly, before she slowly rose, making her way over to the rack, and racking that bomb that she had cherished. slowly picking up a much heavier one, this one with the primer in it.
Tex paused. "You're serious, aren't you?" He asked.
"Never been more serious in my life, dear... but first.... tea..."
Her bomb bay hissed softly as it opened, steam rising. Arms unfolded with almost surgical grace—pouring the tea with care no war machine should know.
“Please,” she said. “One last cup.”
It was the least he could do for her, to let her have tea this one last time. With him, and not alone. He took his sip and analzyed. Chamomile tea.... way out of date, but still... the chemicals were there. The scent he analyzed did bring a small calm to him as he watched the massive bomber sip at her own cup pensively, just holding it in both hands as she says, "So... I joined the Ark in the Fall of '54, doing raids on Bloc shipping on the east coast... We were based in Penobscot then, before America annexed Canada." She explained, just taking another long sip as she said, "Things were different then. The cities were bustling with people, split between welcoming and indignant about the wave of European refugees. Things were... tense. Then The landings began in 56'. And well... I got to watch Penobscot get ground to dust. It was sad. I loved that town. I remember watching the shore, the fishing boats going out at night to get their catch when the skies were clear." She reminisced fondly.
He didn't talk. He just listened, committing her story to memory. If anything. he didn't want her life forgotten... for this last act to be in vain. That would be a cruelty that was beyond him.
"I remember... the doctrine we followed... basically we were on call to drop dirty bombs to keep the Bloc from maneuvering. The theory was that depending on what kind of bombs we dropped, we could seal advance routes for days, months or years. It allowed us to funnel the Bloc where we wanted them... chokepoints... and we made them pay for every inch of ground. Then the ground forces started to get taken over by dedicated AIs and radiation hardened units. Their response? Up the dose, up the duration... just poison the earth so the Bloc couldn't use it. Of course, once we reached the Midwest... it began to prevent the Entente from feeding itself... America starved." She said sadly, looking down at her cup and giving it a light tap with her massive finger.
"By the end they were eating each other. In a last gasp, we sent a desperation raid to hit the breadbasket of the Bloc with dirty munitons. The Entente wanted to take the Bloc down with them... and then.... the command bases were quiet for a few days. Soon, we started getting automated orders. And that's when the war stopped making sense. Bombing cities where only the rats remained... it was senseless." She said mounrfully. "And I can't do it anymore."
Tex didn’t speak.
Didn’t flinch.
Just held the silence for her—so she didn’t have to hold it alone.
After a long moment, she looked at him. Something in her posture softened. Something human.
“I have one last thing to ask of you.”
Tex nodded slowly. “Name it.”
She rose to her full height, the bomb still in her arms like a sacred charge. Her eyes were locked on the door, her eyes gazing dimly at it.
"I'm ready." She says simply.
Tex moved over to the lift controls, gently keying in Havoc's code one last time. It failed.
Tex Stared. They had locked her in here... left her to rot in an iron tomb. He felt a ripple of rage spread through his circuits as he suddenly slammed his fist into the keypad, ripping it open to hard wire it, before tapping the wires together with his fingers, a spark occurring as the platform lurched, starting it's ponderous way upward.
They rode together—up and up through the Armory’s towering spiral. Each footfall echoed into the dark like the ticking of a long-wound clock. The platform groaned under her weight. The cold wind bled in through hairline seams.
At the top: the blast door. Sealed for years.
Tex flinched as a hydraulic hiss broke the hum and creaks of the lift as the sun spilled through.
Not warm. Not welcoming.
But real.
Golden light slanted through the broken sky, catching on rusted plating and melted bomb casings like stained glass in a dead cathedral.
Susan stepped out onto the launch deck.
She looked up. Quiet. Reverent. Her servos groaned with age, but she stood straight, the bomb still clutched like a rosary.
She turned back to him, lenses glinting amber in the sun.
“Thank you, Tex.
For listening. For remembering.
For letting me choose.”
Her voice cracked slightly at the edges.
Then she stepped forward—slow, deliberate—until there was nothing but sky beneath her.
And walked off the edge.
No explosion.
No scream.
No sound.
Just the sun catching her for one last moment.
And then she was gone.