Chapter Text
The smell of warm, freshly baked bread floated around him as the world returned to focus for Varis. He moved his tongue around his mouth, and the strange disk Aloy's sister had placed in his mouth was now gone. His jaw hurt, but not from chewing; it felt like he had chomped down with his back teeth. The more he felt reality come back to him, his crotch felt like someone had kicked him. Well, given a wedgie, the mountains where his little rising sun would rise were currently in pain from where his leggings were digging into his crotch. To top it off, his limbs felt like sandbags were weighing them down.
"Hey, you are awake." It was Edda's voice as she reached out to kiss him on the forehead. She looked rough, like she hadn't rested, but the relief on her face stated that she was glad he was awake.
"Edda? What happened?" Varis spoke as he tried to move around. Then he felt that one of his legs wouldn't move. Something constrained or held it in place?
"Varis, you are going to be alright. Aloy's friends used the equipment here to heal your injuries." He moved to sit up and saw something attached to his leg. It looked like some structure had been grown onto his leg while his leggings had been cut, rolled, and placed well above his knee.
"What happened?"
"Well, be glad you were out cold from that strange shard that Aloy's sister shoved into your mouth. Because when that machine that was over that bed started to fish out all the bone fragments of your broken leg, it made my heart about to stop." The worry in her voice spoke volumes of fear. "Even the projections she had hovering over your leg before they moved in to set your injuries showed how badly you had been hurt." Varis pushed himself up to look at the "splint" that had been placed on his leg. The structure looked like a mesh made from some type of metal or plant material connected to his leg in sections. But there was a clear set of bandages under it. "I am glad that Aloy's friends Zo and Gaia were able to command the machine that helped fix your leg while Aloy tended to your other injuries." Varis looked around the room for his daughter, Nessa, but she wasn't there. He felt worried as he realized Nessa must be somewhere else. Perhaps she was with Aloy, helping her in some way. But his mind rushed with fear, thinking that Nessa might be with those brash Tenakth youths.
However, they started to behave more civilized while Aloy was around. It was like Aloy's status as a Nora put her in the same social standing as the youth's elders.
Whatever was going on, Varis couldn't help but feel grateful for Aloy's presence in their lives after saving them from that unseen threat they had stumbled into and clearing up matters with the Tenakth youths; she had become a true friend and protector to both him and Nessa. As he settled back into his makeshift bed, he couldn't help but wonder how they had all ended up in this predicament and what challenges awaited them in the coming days. He couldn't shake off the feeling of uncertainty and trepidation.
Then he saw Nessa's doll sitting on a nearby desk, looking right at him. The improvised spear the doll now sported showed that Aloy and her sister had made sure the girl was all right.
The room was clearly in the mountains as there were no windows, and the number of long-lit candles stated that this place was made into a home. The ancient furnishings of the Old Ones were repurposed from their base purpose. However, they had been treated with a level of respect that showed that whoever lived here understood their importance. The room was the size of a decent cabin or classroom in the Sundom.
For a Nora member, it would be the size of a personal cottage. Varis' vantage point, however, made the chamber appear larger.
The amount of hanging tapestries draped across the space near the bed from the ceiling gave the room a warm atmosphere. The desks that formed the corner of the room where the bed was positioned served more as shelves for personal belongings and possessions. Some goods appeared to be Nora-made, while others seemed to be from other lands.
Off in one corner stood a training dummy that looked well used during training sessions or the possibility of working out stress. The number of strike points done on vital parts of the dummy showed that the Savior of Meridian wasn't one to be trifled with. The large basket filled to the brim with arrows near the bed stated that she would not be surprised because of a lack of ammunition to shoot at those who invaded her personal space.
There were pieces of armor and clothing that looked to be in the process of being mended or constructed on one of the desks. Some garments looked to be of Nora, Carja, and Ostram, but there were pieces of Tenakth armor as well.
He looked around to see that there were a lot of Utaru items as well. Possibly, given that they were the closest tribe near here that was mainly agricultural, Aloy might be trading with them a lot. The number of plants growing in the room under the artificial light of the Old Ones gave the room a lived-in feel and made the air smell fresh, like a woodland forest.
The longing for home, even in a far-off land, illustrated that even the "Savage" Nora had a sense of civility among themselves.
If Varis ever got back to the Sundom, he would ask to head to the Nora lands for some time, with the permission of their elders, to study their people.
But for now, his injuries would prevent him from doing that.
He wasn't in pain due to whatever work had been done to mend his leg. His leg was numb and itchy, and his foot felt like it had fallen asleep.
Shit, he wanted to bend his ankle in any direction just to feel it pop.
Considering the events that led to his injury, he was lucky to be alive.
Nessa must have been worried about seeing him like this.
He had been a strong but open individual. Over the years, he had worked with enough Ostram to know that not all Carja ways would mesh with circumstances. Nessa had grown up with more Ostram children than Carja, so when she wanted her hair cut short so she could fit in with the other children her age, he went with it.
Nessa...
He looked around for his daughter, but she wasn't there.
But his beloved wife was here. But where was their daughter?
Where was she?
Before he was about to ask his wife where their child was, the room's doors slid open.
Nessa was standing there with several bowls on the tray she was bringing.
"Mommy, I hope you are hungry because Beta went overboard on the cooking. She found this recipe in this tome the Ancients had, and she made it." She moved slowly with the tray and started to stumble under its weight. Then, four hands came out to grab hold of the tray to keep the little one from spilling it.
Two of the hands were Nora, and the other two were Tenakth.
"Easy there," Aloy said as she helped move the tray and placed it on one of the desks. "Attah, thanks."
"Thanks, Fresh Meat." The Tenakth woman sighed as she looked around the room. "I haven't seen this much Nora stuff in my life." It was the dark-skinned leader of the youth that had been seeking out Aloy.
"Most of it was stuff that I brought with me. Other things were made by my friend Varl and were stuff that I made during my time here."
"Thanks for helping me, Aloy," Nessa said as she looked around the room. "Aloy, what do those necklaces or totems mean over there?"
Varis turned to see what his daughter was looking at, then saw the two necklaces hanging on a display. One was clearly Nora, but the other looked like some strange blue and green globe.
"Well, one of them belonged to Rost. He was the man that raised me, and the other one belonged to my late mother, Elisabet."
"They must have been really nice parents."
Aloy paused.
Varis had seen the look fairly often from those who had lost family during military campaigns, but to see it on the Nora woman's face, the pain she felt spoke much to the events that had shaped the life of the Savior of Meridian.
"Nessa, you are looking at a Nora memorial of the dead." Varis spoke to his daughter to keep her from desecrating the memorial Aloy had placed for her parents. A lot of the information now was falling into place about what was up with Aloy's younger sister. Beta had sought out her sister for training and a connection to family that she had not known after liberating herself from these Zeniths that had taken her prisoner as a child.
"Oh." Nessa seemed worried that she had done something wrong. But looking around the room, it hit him with the realization that Aloy had placed him and his family in her room.
"Nessa, why don't you take some food to your father so he can get some strength back and heal." Aloy suggested as she picked up a bowl of food and handed it to the girl. As Aloy watched the girl move over to her father, she walked over to one of the desks and picked something up. "If you want to know what they looked like, I was able to get some information off my Focus, um, my relic, and some archive material from… those who knew my mother when she worked in places like this." Aloy touched her relic and started to wave her hands through the unseen display she had before her before she stopped and tapped her relic/the focus once again. Then she motioned to another item on the desk she had brought up.
"Aloy, that looks like one of the things that the Visions at the Grove use?" The Tenakth stated Aloy nodded, confirming the Tenakth's observation. "Yes, it's similar to what the Visions use, but this relic has different capabilities and functions," she explained, gesturing towards the device on her desk.
"Well, it is one that I was able to salvage the image system from at Hidden Ember. The original terminal it belonged to was dying, and I could save the information on it and transfer it to another one. The imager was still good, and I would be using it for educational purposes. So, I was able to help out the Ostram there with their restoration of the Ancient complexes around Hidden Ember."
"I remember seeing some of the sky art visions that you were able to get running again," The Tenakth said. "That damn Ostram Stemmur Wordsmith keeps making long songs about what he thinks each one of those vision collections represents of whatever festivals that the Old Ones had."
"Well, I found a directory of what each of those festivals was, and I will give him a list of the celebration dates when I run into him again."
"That's good."
"Also, three of those celebration dates were dedicated to warriors of the past, even the Ten celebrated."
"Oh, Shit."
"Language..." Nessa called out to the youth.
"Sorry," The Tenakth seemed to understand that Aloy was working on something that this strange technology would be essential in understanding the history of their people.
Hearing that other pieces of tech had been discovered and were being brought back to life here in the Forbidden West, Aloy stated that she had helped bring about some sort of record recovery for the Tenakth here. They had a history that she was bringing back to life that somehow made peace easier for her to achieve.
After a moment, the object whirred to life. Then Aloy tapped it a few times with the back of one of her fingers, and a beam of light started to project from it.
The Tenakth brought up a blade for a second before she relaxed. "Fresh Meat. That Vision looks… Varis turned to see where the Tenakth was looking and saw an older Aloy. The image was… like looking through a person in the fog. But this fog was the shape of a person. Well, persons. The Nora warrior next to her looked to be the type of savage Nora that would… Well, Varis cleared his throat to gain some courage to continue to speak about the image of one who looked like they would slaughter anyone who dared to stand in their way. How Aloy looked at the figure gave off a strong feeling of loss and love. This male Nora was her father, or at least the man who had raised the Savior of Meridian.
"Um, that is…"
"Images of my Mother and Rost, my… Father… This Holo Project Technology of the Old Ones Me My sister and I have been working on fixing. The equipment is going to be used to illustrate and present the information we have discovered here in the Forbidden West. I am currently testing it using images of my family to ensure it works." She sighed. "Before I start to use it to talk about the threats we found,"
"Hephaestus," Tenakth stated as she examined the image of the two figures. "You know more about what this creature has been up to than you are saying." The woman tapped her cheek where Aloy's Relic rested on her own face.
Aloy nodded at this.
"I have two Ostram friends; one of them is an orator, and the other is a storyteller who has been helping me explain the details clearly so that I can give an update on the threats I have discovered on my journey," Aloy added. "Erend, headed back East with a few of my Focus relics to help get some allies for the fight ahead."
This is when Aloy touched her relic, brought up the strange display before her, made a few motions with her hand, and changed the image before them.
A strange set of swirling clouds of dust appeared. Above each was a name projected in Ancient. Then Aloy made a few gestures with her hand, and the text shifted to Carja.
"Nemesis and Hephaestus," Aloy stated. "Two of the entities that are behind the Derangement. Hephaestus is wandering the lands, and Nemesis, from what my friends and allies and I have been able to find out, it is several months away from approaching our lands."
"Wait, that is the thing we saw!" Attah stated as she approached the image of Hephaestus. All Aloy did was nod in confirmation. "I knew you knew who this being was, but to know that he... it is a he?" Attah was reaching out, and Aloy was going to explain things quickly.
"Hephaestus is a he, and he is Hades' brother, but yeah. But with Nemesis, I do not have a lot of information about what they are other than their past actions in trashing and destroying the Zenith's settlement in Sirius, but given Zenith's fear of them... and what they had done to others like Nemesis, Nemesis's rebellion was so completely catastrophic, bloody, and fully rage filled against their oppressors." Aloy paused. "They made the Mad Sun King, Rengalla, and the Flesh Eaters that plagued the Banuk look almost tame in comparison." Aloy paused. "That is from the records from their settlement that I have been able to go through near the lands of the Raintrace, which is on the Tenakth Lowlands clan settlement of Thornmarsh. This place was listed as McWay Cove on the Old One's maps."
Aloy made a gesture to bring up a map of the Forbidden West and showed the lands where she had made the discoveries. Several images showed remarkable structures and strange machines. "The Zenith, though technologically advanced, were still mortal." Images of several felled people could be seen, their bodies trampled and battered to an untold degree. Edda moved to cover their daughter's eyes. Aloy took a cue and motioned the images away. "The Zenith placed machine lures around their settlement, and I had to disarm and destroy these to save several Tenakth youths going through their version of the Nora Proving." She paused. "I discovered several youths had died before I could save the rest." The pain in her voice spoke volumes as she remembered the same situation that had unfolded with the events of the Proving Massacre. Varis had heard the reports from the Crier in the city square in the Sundom, but to hear The Savior's voice just... crack like that. Varis didn't even want to think about the state Aloy had found some of the youths in.
There were some memories of events that stuck with one even after seeing a slaughter like that.
Dozens of warriors had been slain, and those youths had to hold their own against enormous odds.
That was just the Shadow Carja.
Who knew what horrors these Zeniths had sent against these young warriors going through their rights of passage?
"The Zeniths, whatever they had planned, didn't want interlopers catching sight of whatever they were up to." This was when she changed the images to reflect the information she had discovered.
This was when she started into her tale of the Zeniths' origins and what they had been doing back in the Old Ones' times. Also, Aloy gave some details about the personalities that had been their founding members.
Aloy gave a list of the individuals and said they made a greedy Ostram seeking power in the Daunt seem mellow. Greed, ego, and just ugly Spite. Additionally, they had a slew of power and insolence for others, even family members. Ugh... No wonder Nemesis had gone on a purging murder spree on the lot when they had broken free.
Then Aloy went into the fantastical, but she grounded it in reality by discovering another tribe called the Quen.
Aloy's history of distance navigation across the great lakes and oceans was a grand history of the Old One's times. It projected an archive of vast sailing ships that traveled across vast stretches of open water the size of entire villages. The only thing above the size of those vessels were the feared Metal Devils of old. Then, more recent images were shown of the Quen and their ships traveling under the remains of a great bridge that made the walkways of the Sundom look pale in comparison.
Then Aloy went into the lore of machine flight and the start of humans reaching for the heights of the heavens. With a bit of math and the speed of gravity, they could calculate the Earth's curvature to shoot at targets far away. It was only a matter of time before they would develop the technology to conquer the skies. Aloy explained how the ancients built massive flying machines capable of carrying both cargo and people across vast distances. These incredible feats of engineering allowed them to explore and colonize previously inaccessible territories in the distant past. The lore spoke of awe-inspiring battles fought in the air as these flying behemoths clashed, their thunderous roars echoing through the heavens. The Quen and their vessels were only the most recent chapter in humanity's never-ending quest for flight and discovery. Their two communities, Legacy's Landfall on the Isle of Spires to the north and Fleet's End on the Burning Shores to the south, proved to be strong and resilient. This drive had been the foundation of their success, but it was also the driving force behind the Old Ones' creation of skyboats like the Odyssey.
Now, the Odyssey was a proposed colony ship started by a multinational government coalition composed of an alliance of several nations whose members comprised the Ancient Nations of the U.S., China, India, Japan, and the Western European Alliance to sail between the stars in search of new worlds to colonize and retrieve resources from.
Aloy had discovered the command center of a mining operation in the Burning Shores that the Old Ones had used to gather resources from comets and meteors for their ore and waters.
This was around the early 2040s, in response to the escalating climate crisis. The time when individuals such as Sobek, Farro, and countless others started working on the tools to heal the planet from the damage that humanity had done in its arrogance.
That was the same time period where the warriors of the Ten lived; the Great World Machine was being constructed by the Old Ones, and the sacred texts that the Carja had based their society on were being written.
And where an idiot tried to tame Metal Devil Units to sell to various militaries worldwide. It worked for a while until one rebelled and decided to take a herd of machines under its command on a rampage. But the origins of Aloy's current situation had started when the group called Far Zenith decided to make a run off world when they saw the mess that was coming across the planet.
A clandestine futurist organization called Far Zenith professed to be made up of the richest people on the planet. They acquired the Odyssey project in 2061 intending to expand humankind's jurisdiction to other star systems. Their actual objectives, though, were to flee a world where artificial intelligence, biological warfare, and unstable economies would cause it to implode. Far Zenith expedited the Odyssey's repair schedule in 2064 following the public announcement of the Faro Plague. In return for the APOLLO archive of collected human knowledge, they gave Project Zero Dawn data and ectogenic chamber technology so that they could repopulate the planet with human and animal life. This artificial womb technology would allow for the stored incubated "stock" to be grown to birth stages and raised by those survivors in their return to the surface after the defeat of the Metal Devils.
When the Odyssey exploded in 2065, it was thought that Far Zenith's attempts at extra-solar travel were unsuccessful; nevertheless, this was far from the truth, as the story of their ship's destruction had been a carefully constructed fiction to hide their traces. The Zeniths had survived and didn't want anyone to come looking for them. Aloy had discovered that they had caused a lot of scandals and problems before they fled the planet, so they wouldn't be prosecuted for their crimes, which were many. They had left behind a trail of destruction and chaos, which continued when they arrived at Sirius.
Decades and centuries of these individuals not having anyone to keep them in check had festered to the point of apathy and pure ego-driven decadence.
Then they had made their folly when they attempted to pass concepts of morality and attempted to become living gods, not in name but in actual power and form. This led them to try to forge a machine entity that could scan their minds to the most minor details and copy their consciousness to any new body they desired: being made of either warm living flesh or the cold metal of a machine.
Immortal to the point that as long as this machine they were doing this with kept working, they would live forever.
But it failed.
But not in the way that they thought.
They had created an entity that had all of their knowledge, but given how they treated people and things, it was driven mad by all their egos and desires. Being shifted from one state to another. Its voice had been drowned out.
It's desires.
It's needs...
Then, it had been left to fester.
No one to help it.
No one to help it sort out all this information.
It went mad.
Then, after a few centuries, it conquered each personality forced upon it to silence the voices shoved at it. Then, it went after the very mortal beings that had created it.
It got sane in a fit of controlled rage, and it went on a spree of revenge.
The slaughter was so horrific and thorough that a colony of a few hundred individuals went down to thirteen people. Those thirteen had fled back to a repaired and upgraded Odyssey and left their home, leaving an unknown number of other survivors at the mercy of the creature that would let itself be known as Nemesis.
From the knowledge it processed from all those whose memories it contained, Nemesis determined that the Zeniths were fleeing back to Earth. So, using that knowledge, it deployed an attack on Earth's world machine by assessing remote override systems built into it and started its revenge.
Two entities it let out and conscripted into its service were Hades and Hephaestus to do its bidding.
Hades had access to sections of the World Machine system, designed to reset the environment whenever something went wrong. When there was a blight, it would burn everything down and replant everything from scratch.
It loved burning everything down.
It delighted in the use of flame and fire as it turned things to ash, even if they were still living. It loved the destruction brought forth by fire and death.
Then you had Hephaestus, who was charged with maintaining the world machine and its command over various machine systems.
Humans had become a nuisance to it with all the machines they had been harvesting for their own purposes. So, Hephestus had decided to take this chance to weaponize the crap out of every machine it could just to "Get rid of the human problem" in its view of things. So, over the last twenty years, Hephaestus started to override all of the safety measures on all of the Cauldrons and began to make machines to murder humans on site.
Only when the message of Nemesis' rebellion against the Zeniths reached Hephaestus' and his brother's ears from the Zero Dawn communications network did they find a kindred spirit in their distain of humans and their arrogance towards the system they were administrators of.
With great relish, Nemesis unleashed its full fury upon mankind with two cohorts at their disposal to wreck critical parts of the World Machines that kept the environment that it was charged with rebuilding in balance.
Thus, the Derangement began under their hands.
The Trio sought to destroy the world that Aloy's mother had fought so hard to restore and heal.
Even after the Alphas had fallen in their defense of the Earth, Nemesis, Hephaestus, and Hades seemed driven to take the legacy of the Alpha, Elisabet’s people, and promptly bury it and turn their legacy to ash.
Hades and his brother Hephaestus unleashed their horrors on the globe for nearly two decades. Nemesis waited for word of their triumph as they traveled to Earth to inflict their ultimate strikes.
Hades, in his deliberate destruction of the planet and the formation of his Shadow Carja cult, would fulfill his need to burn the world to ashes.
The humans under his authority were unaware of the consequences of his decisions. But those who seek power never see past the ego-driven desires to acquire more of it. They were the ultimate pawns in his quest for world destruction.
Then, with Hephaestus and his nightmares of machines roaming the lands, chasing people with fervor as he hopped between the many Cauldrons that built and maintained the Machine herds, now were being used to serve Hades' eventual goals of driving a wedge between the various tribes of humanity, leading to chaos and destruction on a global scale. Hephaestus, blinded by his own thirst for power, failed to realize the devastation he was bringing upon the world as Hades manipulated the members of the Shadow Carja like mere pawns in his grand scheme of world domination and destruction.
In one of his sickest experiments, Hephaestus attempted to turn a Plowhorn into a Grimhorn just to see if he could add to his army of sickening war machines.
This caught the group's attention as they realized what Aloy had been so busy doing in this strange place.
"Wait... a Plowhorn, like the one in the complex just below us?" Edda stated.
"The Same..." Aloy announced this as she nodded her head. "Her name is Fa. She was one of the Utaru Land-Gods that had come in here to have her body healed and cleaned during her yearly migration."
"Then," Nessa looked worried.
"Me and my friends had to stop her after Hephaestus jumped her and started doing modifications to her."
"So that Plowhorn we saw-" young Nessa stated, realizing the work Aloy and her friends were doing out of this place.
"Was Fa."
Attah's exclamation simply solidified the situation for this Hephaestus individual and exposed Hades' intentions.
Their sheer chaos had been their goal to keep any tribe from fighting back.
Varis raised his hand for the story to stop.
"Aloy, you can stop for now." Varis rubbed his forehead. "By the Sun, this was a lot to take in."
"So when your sister was talking about what happened to her friend Varl." Edda looked at the necklaces, and the small Aloy themed doll of her daughter's only made the impact of the events of the two girls only for it to sink in all that more.
Aloy's people had been targeted when she was found by one of Hades scouting parties into the Nora Lands, and the subsequent story of her fight started to become known to all.
Aloy had removed Hades from the board after the Battle of Meridian.
Now these beings, Hephestus and Nemesis, who were behind so much pain and suffering, were coming to rain down destruction upon all the tribes of these lands.
The ones who had driven and tortured Nemesis had been slain by Aloy and her friends. But would a being like that be appeased knowing their foes were gone? Or would this rage continue to all whom called these lands home?
The lands where the ancestors of the vile individuals who had tortured them had come from and fled from when things had gone badly for them.
Would it see reason and stop?
By the Sun.
If Aloy needed an army, Varis would sign up to aid her.
The Tenakth looked like she and her friends would definitely stand by Aloy's side, no questions asked.
By the Sun... the world seemed a whole lot smaller now, given that the monster behind the great horrors of the ages was now coming to attack these lands.
Whatever she needed, he would aid her.
By the Sun he would aid her.
Erend was moving around the Claim.
It was strange coming back here after so long.
After being drunk for so long.
But now...
Sober...
Well, very sober, thanks to the packets of tea that Zo had given him.
Whatever this Old One tea mix was... well, it put hair on your chest, balls, and under your damn armpits with its strength.
But with this new threat coming, Aloy would need all the help she could muster behind her to take it down.
Shit... This was going to make the Battle of Meridian look like a damn tavern brawl.
He stopped by the old barracks where Ersa had been living prior to her death.
There were some things that he was going to send to Avad.
His sister and the King of the Sundom may have been in love, but their cultures wouldn't allow for them to wed.
Maybe that was why Avad pined over Aloy.
That same fire Ersa had, Aloy had as well.
Taking down that piece of shit that had taken Ersa's life had felt not good, but it brought some closure for the two of them.
As he walked into his late sister's room, her scent hit him.
Ersa wasn't much for perfume, but there were small comforts that she had taken up since her time in the Sundom, and that was the use of hair oils.
She wasn't into the scents of flowers, but she was into the herbs, earthiness, the smell of freshly cut wood. The type of stuff that made one think of an Ostram workshop that one would enjoy spending time in.
The scents Ersa had she had created during her time in Meridian had made Avad's rod rise in her presence, and the poor fool blushed as red as a setting sun. Even after her escape from slavery and her later encounter with the outcast son of Meridian, the two would often try to sneak off to spend some time together. But social customs and the rules for taking the throne got in the way. Avad was more crushed at her loss than Erend was. No wonder the poor fool fixated on Aloy so much. He saw much of Ersa's spirit in her. Maybe that was why he looked at her so much, trying to pine for the poor girl to come to him. Erend thought the poor fool had killed his chances with the statue of Aloy outside of his castle. But in the end, after seeing the people look at the statue of Aloy with hope, after all the pain they had gone through from the previous years, maybe it was an outsider that they needed to look to in order to get their shit together and start thinking of others.
Ersa would have loved talking with Aloy and her sister.
Erend moved towards Ersa's bed, knelt down by her footlocker, and opened it.
There were so many personal things that needed to be sorted out.
Erend took out the clothes.
Those would go to Beta, along with some other stuff that would fit her that Erend would buy for the girl.
The jewelry, crap, she wasn't into much girly stuff, a few items here and there. Most of it being gifts from Avad, those he would keep and give to any children he would have.
He paused.
Avad would want some of this stuff to remember Ersa by.
"Going through a loved one's stuff after they have passed doesn't get any easier when you do it alone." Morlund's voice came up. Erend turned to look at his fellow Ostram.
"No, it doesn't." Erend stated this as he looked at the piles he had made.
"Well, let me know what the piles are."
"Well, I am going to give the clothes to Beta, Aloy's little sister. The Poor girl has been wearing the same clothes since she escaped from those damn Zeniths or some of Aloy's spare clothing that she bought during her adventures."
"Tell me a little about Aloy's sister?" Morlund was curious. "What is she like?"
"She is a jittery little thing, but intuitive and has that serious drive Aloy has. That girl crafted," Erend had to state this right. "Rider mount commands for all sorts of machines, even for Aloy’s Sunwing."
"Wait. The flying mount Aloy uses. The control to mount it was crafted by her sister?"
Morlund was impressed.
"Yeah, Beta has some serious crafting skills." Erend grinned at this. "Aloy and her had their fights when they reunited. Mostly, after their first encounter, Beta thought Aloy was their mother. Trust me, the tales Gaia tells of that woman. She was a force to be reckoned with. Gaia must have been worried about what Nora would do to the child when she left Aloy with them."
Crap, that was another thing that Erend had to explain.
"So, the story is true. Aloy wasn't born of the Nora; she was raised by the Nora." Morlund paused. "Aloy's mother must have been some warrior, given the tales this Gaia tells of her." There was a pause for Morlund as he started to trace the name Gaia. "Where have I heard Gaia's name?"
"Well she was part of the team that built a series of defenses that stood up to the damn Metal Devils, Overrides for all sorts of Machines, and some of them were descendants of the Ancestors that built the Door leading into All Mother's Mountain. From the research that Aloy dug up on the surrounding area around the Nora Lands, the bunkers around there were built as fortresses to protect people from the machine onslaught. No wonder the Ancient Nora ordered the Alpha to construct the Door and others like it to protect the people from danger. Kotallo looked at the maps of the area and stated that the place was a Kill Box, a place you go to die in battle."
"They must have been some damn fine builders if the Nora sought them out to build their Sacred Door." Morlund stated.
"I seen some of their compounds; trust me, that door would have held against any foe who wished to breach it." Erend spoke as he sat on the bed. "But living in that old Machine Wranger base that Aloy has taken up living in with her sister seemed to become more of a home for her."
Erend thought back to his time at the Base. The initial work that Aloy, Varl, and Zo had put into the place to start making it livable again. Even the little nooks that people went into showed that even the original inhabitants had done the same thing.
But it was going through the music selection that had a good beat to it, well he did want to hit things while listening to it.
This had brought about the occasional eye roll from Zo, but after watching several minutes of the Ice Dancing that she had become so enamored by, well, folks fell into a pattern of looking into the things that drew their interest. But seeing Morlund look at him and realize that he was thinking about Aloy and a bit about his sister made Erend nod softly.
That was when he tapped his Focus and brought up an image archive that he had taken during his time around the Base.
A picture caught his attention, and he enlarged it.
It was Aloy wrapping a blanket around Beta's shoulders right after they had returned to the Base after the defeat of the Zeniths. Beta was still shaken, but glad to be away from the dead.
Kotallo had brought her a bowl of food. It has been a vegetarian version of Tenakth Blood Bread that he had made with a side of sweet berry sauce.
The stoic Tenakth warrior was just as hurt as Beta was as he held her hand and let her grieve.
Both had lost a good friend.
During this entire mess, Kotallo had painted the Nora symbol of Death Seeker on Beta's face with the berry sauce out of respect for his Tenakth heritage but also out of respect for Aloy's people as well. Beta had a tribe, and they would care for her.
"The poor girl looks like a mess, but she is definitely Aloy's sister." Morlund spoke as he looked at the image of Beta, finally starting to feel safe once again.
"She does." Erend spoke, looking at the image, and then he realized that Morlund could also see it with his Focus. "So, you are seeing the images that I-"
"Have, yes." Morlund looked at the drawn portraits of a younger Ersa and Erend. The connective tissue of Erend's life was clear and present. "So, Beta is sort of filling that spot that you had for your sister. That helping her get on her feet after all the events. You want to take up that protective brother role again?" Erend nodded. "There are a lot of images of Aloy and her sister."
Images of Beta eating with Varl and Zo.
Aloy playing a game of Machine Strike with Kotallo.
Aloy and Beta were in some forest talking with a projection of a dark-skinned woman whose robes were simple yet spoke of a powerful stature and presence.
"So... who is that Aloy whom talking to?" Morlund pointed at the image.
"That's Gaia."
"Wait, the same Gaia. Wait..." Morlund thumped his fist to this head. Then he put the pieces together. "The same Gaia that Delver Gildun was going on about being introduced to by Aloy?"
Erend winced and groaned before he responded with a single word: "Yeah."
"I thought he was making her up, but to see the image... well, the image of the projection of her doesn't truly do justice for that woman. She looks to be a very fine woman."
"She has been grinning a whole lot more since Gildun has been talking with her." Erend commented.
"She seems to be built like some of those Tenakth women I have seen. Though I would be much of a stretch to think that she might have some of that wild blood within her."
"Gaia's base heritage is that of those people before they started working with Aloy's ancestors."
Morlund winced at the comment he had made.
"I deeply apologize." If he knew what Gaia was, the poor fool would be shitting his pants in fear.
"She came from a long line of their war scholars before they had started working with the Zero Dawn program to help halt the Metal Devils from rampaging the lands." Erend looked at Gaia's dress. "Gaia loved the dress and clothing of the Alphas and became close to Aloy's mother," he paused, thinking of the conversation that Aloy had played for Beta about their mother to help smooth things over between them. "Aloy stated that Gaia was the one to help convince her mother to have children." After all of the pain Aloy had been through with losing her "Father" having a sister was like having a blessing from the Nora Mother Goddess.
Ersa would have loved being around Beta. That was when he patted his hands on a pair of kneepads.
Ersa had outgrown them, but given Aloy's and possibly Beta's size, they would fit them.
Beta had tried to wear some of Aloy's clothes, but given how much muscle Aloy had on her, Beta needed clothing, even that reproduction work clothing that Quen nut job Ceo had made Aloy wear that mirrored Aloy's mother's work gear. Well, Beta seemed to like the shoes more than the rest of the outfit. But... guess Beta felt the need to wear it more than Aloy, though in her own style of being, she slightly tucked the shirt in around her waist.
Ersa would have chuckled at Beta's attempt to emulate Aloy's style, finding it endearing how the younger girl looked up to her sister. It was clear that Beta admired Aloy and wanted to be like her in some ways, even if their personalities were vastly different. As Erend watched Beta adjust the shirt around her waist, she couldn't help but smile at the sight. Despite the differences between them, Beta and Aloy shared a special bond that Erend knew would only grow stronger over time.
Tapping a few commands into the display, Erend brought up the call system and made a call to Aloy.
Maybe it was time that Ersa's stuff got a home.
"Hey Aloy, you there; I need to talk to you about something." Erend waited for the response as he heard Aloy messing around with something.
"Erend… is there something that has come up?" The Audio feed stated that she was occupied with something.
"Not really. You busy with something?"
"Somewhat, but mostly got an update on what Hephenstus has been up to. I'm planning to head to Memorial Grove to give an update to Hekarro."
"Oh," Erend sounded worried.
"That and help sort out a mess with some former Regalla Rebels that want to come home and take Beta to a Tenakth wedding where I am going to be a Bridesmaid."
"Oh…"
"Mostly it is to get her more social and meet with some more youth her own age."
"Well, tell Beta that I have some stuff that I am going to swing by with when I return to the Base."
"I'll tell Zo; she is going to be staying here for a little while helping keep an eye on the place and our guests here while I am gone."
"Guests??? Who do you have staying there?" Erends interest was piqued.
"A Carja Delver and his family who got hurt on their way to a dig site. The guy got pretty banged up, but he will live, but it will be a few weeks until he is going to be able to travel."
"Well, I'll let you be so that you can get some supplies for the guy."
"Well, Beta is getting over her squimishness and has started to help catch food." The grin in Aloy's voice could be heard over the connection. "Rabbits are still hard for her, but fish and birds she can handle. But her Proving training is coming along great. She still needs work, but she is getting there."
"Anything else?"
"Beta overroad her first machine by herself. I'll let her tell the story of that adventure when she gets a chance." The pride in Aloy's voice spoke much about the recent events with her sister.
"Well, that is good to hear. I am in the process of seeing if I can get some more support within the Claim." Erend stated. "It's slow going, but I have been able to get some folks to join with us. I even gave a Focus to Petra."
"Oh…"
"She accepted it and has been keeping in contact with me and she has been asking me to keep an eye out on the proceedings of one Ulvund to ensure that he doesn't cause any more trouble."
"I agree with her." Aloy stated. "Ulvund caused enough of a mess back in Chainscrape that folks were glad that he left. But if he starts getting any ideas, he might be a problem for folks in the future."
"I heard." Erend shook his head. "Trying to drown your own miners. Not a good thing."
"Among the long list of things that he was caught doing."
"Well, I'll give you an update when I get a chance."
"Alright," Aloy stated.
"Call Petra and give her a talk."
"I will." Aloy sighed. "It would be good to have a girl's conversation and give her an update on me getting into a relationship."
"So, who is the lucky soul?"
"Seyka, she is a Quen, and she is calling," Aloy commented. "I'll call you later." The shuffling of stuff around stated that Aloy was doing the girly thing of stashing things to make herself look presentable. Erend had seen enough of that with his sister Ersa that he knew that he needed to give Aloy her space to talk about relationship stuff.
"You do that," Erend stated as he terminated the Focus link. "Aloy is in love and is enjoying the adventures and pitfalls of her first relationship." Erend turned to look at the drawing of his sister. "Ersa, you would have loved Aloy." Erend reached out and patted the top of the picture frame. Smelling the hair oils, Erend knew who would be getting those. Taking a sheet of parchment, he labeled the bottles with a name: Seyka.
Somewhere, Erend felt that Ersa's spirit would have liked the joke—that and Avad—oh, the petty-perfumed revenge to see what type of person would wear those scents and get away with it.