Tex leaned against the control tower’s bulkhead. No crash. No final thud. Sky Knight had vanished into smoke and silence. The scent of scorched metal still clung to the air, mingling with old memories—battles fought, brothers lost.

  He closed his eyes.

  Just for a second.

  A silent breath for the fallen—friend and foe alike.

  Sky Knight was out of the way. The path to Helga and Dollface was clearer now. But before that...

  If he could make it back to the armory, he might stand a better chance of surviving whatever hell waited in D3.

  That deck still tugged at him.

  Something was moving down there. Something curious. Unsettling.

  And Tex wasn’t the kind of guy to let questions go unanswered.

  He blinked.

  Then stared at the HUD.

  AUTOFORGE: OFFLINE

  Shit.

  He’d dropped it before takeoff—jettisoned for speed—and now it was stuck out there. On a deck crawling with AA.

  Tex ran a hand down his faceplate.

  How the hell was he gonna recover that?

  Not without getting swiss-cheesed by the Ark’s automated defenses.

  No forge meant no ammo manufacturing. No emergency parts. No reactor-stabilizing snacks.

  He was officially on rations.

  “Welp…” he muttered. “This may require some creativity. Lucky for me, that’s my strong suit.”

  He turned on his heel and headed back into the break room.

  First step in every brilliant plan?

  Another can of radioactive swill.

  Low reactor, low optimism, low planning.

  But hey—at least he was hydrated.

  Time to get small.

  Tex folded in his wings—swing joints locking as the panels curled tight to his back, one latch, then another. A final strap cinched them into place, bracing the whole assembly so it wouldn’t rattle.

  Like this, he could move through tight spaces—crawlspaces, emergency shafts, ducts that hadn’t seen traffic in years. As lean as any infantry morph now.

  He pulled up the Ark’s schematics, zooming in deeper than usual. No main corridors. No open walkways. He traced a route through maintenance tunnels and old emergency accessways, detouring through choke points no one used anymore.

  His eyes caught a rubber mat on the floor—once used for crew to wipe their boots.

  Perfect.

  He brought up a schematic of his own chassis, isolating the shape of his landing toes. Then, using scrap and precision torchwork, he cut two crude overshoes from the mat. A little spot melting sealed the backs together.

  Laces were a problem—until he reached for Sarge’s old dog tags.

  "Sorry, old man," he muttered, biting the chain in half and feeding the ends through torch-cut holes. It wasn’t pretty, but the metal held.

  No fashion awards today.

  But his steps were muffled.

  And that was all that mattered.

  He took a few experimental steps.

  The difference was immediate—less clank, more dull thud. Still not silent, but better.

  Tex paused. Played the audio recording back through his sensors. Each footfall echoed louder than he liked.

  He exhaled through his vents.

  Right. Let’s not rush this.

  He slowed his pace.

  One step. Pause. Listen.

  Another step. Adjust.

  Every motion became deliberate. Weight distribution. Joint tension. Audio dampening tweaks.

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  This wasn’t about speed anymore.

  It was about survival.

  Tex looked around for another edge. His optics landed on the jukebox.

  Noise. Controlled, ambient, distracting.

  He keyed up his radio.

  “Hey R/CO—feel like being the Ark’s DJ for a bit?”

  A crackle, then a grin in his ear. “I thought you’d never ask. Just say when to ease off... though I do charge a performance fee.”

  Tex rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah. Once the blackout on my uplink’s lifted, we’ll sort it. Just put it on my tab.”

  “You got it. Cueing up now.”

  He looked down at himself, white as a cloud. That had to change. but... oh man this was gonna be gross...

  He sighed in resignation, muttering under his breath.

  “No biggie… you drank Helga’s rotgut with a gun to your head. You can do this.”

  The nearest morph waste oil tank was one deck down—labeled for disposal, but still partially full. He marked the route, then checked his silhouette settings. That stuff was black as pitch. Thick. Clingy. Perfect for breaking up his outline in the low light.

  Disgusting?

  Absolutely.

  But if it helped him slip past sensors and stay invisible, it was worth it.

  He’d been through worse.

  Just not this kind of worse.

  It only took him a few minutes to access the tank, slipping into it up to his shins as he just... got to work.

  It was revolting. Sludge-thick, industrial reek clogging every joint as he poured it over himself, slicking his frame in foul, oil-black sheen.

  But he didn’t flinch.

  Didn’t gag.

  Instead, he let a small, cold smile creep acros

  s his face as an image bloomed in his databanks—Helga, forced to lick it off his chassis piece by piece after he’d blown her head off… and kept it online just long enough to savor the irony.

  A fantasy, sure.

  But everyone needs a little fuel to keep going.

  He hoisted himself out of the tank, letting out a huff as he closed it behind him.

  t did give him a weird thrill, that image.

  Not pride. Not victory.

  Something darker. Sharper.

  Sexual, maybe.

  He winced at the thought. Maybe his circuits needed checking.

  Not that anyone could.

  The last medic who tried took one look at his diagnostic stack and reached for a factory reset. Said he was “helping.”

  Helping with what?

  Scrubbing him clean so he’d take orders without flinching? Making him a good little soldier again?

  Tex had seen what that kind of “help” had bought mankind. Clean slates and cleaner wars. Sanitized obedience. History repeating with a prettier face and the same old blood underneath.

  No, he’d keep the filth. The corruption. The broken code.

  At least it was his.

  He checked his route again.

  Right… uncomfortable wasn’t the half of it.

  He’d have to cut through irradiated corridors, maintenance shafts never meant for walking, and forgotten guts of the Ark that hadn’t seen light in years. The rads would spike, no question—but if he moved fast, and was mindful of shielding, he’d be fine.

  Probably.

  The upside? Nobody else would be sticking around in those zones either.

  Sometimes, survival was just knowing when to take the path everyone else avoided.

  The movements were slow and deliberate.

  Every step, a calculation. Every turn, a potential trap. He kept to the edges—through service ducts that hadn’t been cleaned since the war began, over rusted grates that flexed with his weight, and beneath walkways clogged with coils of forgotten wiring. At times, he had to crawl—shoulders scraping metal, wings strapped tight against his back, servos whining in protest.

  He passed through cold zones, radiation-heavy chambers where his Geiger meter clicked in warning. Held his breath—not because he needed to, but because it felt right. Like holding still made him smaller. Less real. Less findable.

  When he slipped through one deck's decon chamber, a long-dead sterilization spray hissed out and coated him in residue like powdered bleach. His optics flickered. He tasted copper in the air.

  By the time he finally made it back to A1—his destination—he was caked in dust, drenched in hydraulic sweat, and blackened with soot. Every seam of his frame told a story. His reactor was running lean. His coolant was borderline. But he was alive.

  And he hadn’t fired a single shot.

  That counted for something.

  He checked his acetylene levels.

  Just enough for a single cut.

  No second chances.

  He knelt beneath the deck, optics scanning, cross-referencing old schematics with instinct. The margin for error was razor-thin—he’d only get one shot at this.

  Engines hummed to life as he braced, fist raised.

  Clang.

  Clang.

  Clang.

  The armored panel groaned, resisting—then gave.

  He forced his knuckles into the split, digits too stiff for fine work but strong enough to pry. Inch by inch, he peeled the hull like rusted skin, just wide enough to snake his head through the gap.

  There it was.

  The autoforge.

  Fifteen feet off.

  Damn.

  He ducked back down, recalibrated—fast. Heat blooming at his wrist as the torch lit.

  The cut was clean.

  The panel dropped with a thunderous crash, shaking the floor.

  The autoforge fell with it, skidding across the deck like a tossed coffin.

  And then—

  "HULL BREACH DETECTED."

  "A1 SECTOR 253."

  "REPAIR CREWS: RESPOND IMMEDIATELY."

  The lights strobed red.

  Tex didn’t wait.

  No more stealth. No more silence.

  Time to run.

  He hoisted the autoforge like a football.

  No time for tactics.

  Just speed. Chaos.

  He sprinted blind—no map, no route—turning on impulse, ricocheting off corners, sprinting down halls with no plan but forward.

  Any resistance got shoulder-checked into the deck with brutal efficiency. His left arm was shot anyway—might as well weaponize it. The impacts rang like dropped anvils, his frame snarling against the plating with each slam.

  He barely slowed.

  Just enough to raise his sidearm, barrel-flash lighting up shocked faces.

  Pop-pop.

  Keep moving.

  Bodies hit the floor before their alarms finished sounding.

  No hesitation.

  No mercy.

  Only motion.

  Only escape.

  R/CO’s voice crackled in his ear—frantic, trying to keep pace.

  “Okay, they’ve locked me out—hard. Feels like a goddamn hornet's nest in there. Let me rerout—”

  “I’ve got this,” Tex cut him off, breath ragged. “If we plan—they’ll know exactly where to find me.”

  He didn't slow until the sound of boots and alarms thinned behind him. Finally—silence. Or close enough.

  Tex staggered into a forgotten corridor, dragging the autoforge like it was a wounded limb. Every servo in his body was redlining—warning lights flashing across his HUD like strobe lights.

  He ducked into a maintenance hatch. An old crew lav. Rusted tile. Peeling laminate.

  Perfect.

  He slumped down onto the edge of a toilet, reactor fans wheezing hard as they spun down. His plating steamed. Every breath sounded like it came through a broken radiator.

  He sat there in the quiet.

  Just for a moment.

  Because now was as good a time as any.

  To think. To cool down.

  Or maybe just put himself back together.

  He exhaled, settling against the cold porcelain like a war god taking five.

  “They’ll be sweeping the vents and sealing the bulkheads...”

  He glanced down at the autoforge beside him, then around the room, before starting to open up his belly plating to start the reinstallation process.

  "...Ain’t nobody ever expects the piss break.”