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Snow and branches were scattered as the Frostclaw swiped at Aloy, several trees being knocked down in the process. Her heart was beating at a mile a minute as she slid for cover behind a boulder. She wiped snow off her face before she frantically put more bundles of arrows together and shoved them into her quiver. She kept peeking from behind her cover to make sure the Frostclaw wasn’t about to crack the boulder in half.
Meanwhile, Erend was hiding as well, he’d taken quite a blow earlier from a Fire Clawstrider that jumped on him when he wasn’t looking. He was still alive, thankfully, but he didn’t know if Aloy would be for much longer. He was lying prone in a patch of tall grass, the only thing keeping him from being spotted by the massive machine. He scrambled to think of some way to help Aloy but he didn’t exactly have many resources at his disposal.
Aloy could hear the enraged machine searching for her even as the blistering wind whipped against her face. She patted her belt to see if she had something she could quickly toss behind her so she could escape from this terrible position. At some point in the middle of dispatching the Sons of Prometheus thugs that ambushed them, several of her pouches had been ripped off, along with a piece of her belt. She’d hastily tied the belt together since she obviously didn't have time to repair it. The Frostclaw could still detect her it seemed since it kept pacing around the area she was hidden in.
Erend looked to his left and saw a few of Aloy’s leather pouches lying in the snow not too far from the patch of tall grass he was hiding in. He looked over his options, which he didn't have many of, and decided he was willing to take the risk of exiting cover to allow her to flee from her dangerous hiding spot. He glanced between the Frostclaw and the pouches then made a break for it.
Despite the sharp pain in his chest he sprinted for the pouches and to his delight he saw one of her weapons had fallen out of her bag as well. He grabbed the snow covered blast sling and looked in the pouches: medical supplies and bombs. An excited smile forms on his face seeing the medicinal herbs and ammo, now I have some real firepower!
The Frostclaw heard him and turned around before standing up on its hind legs. His face went ghostly pale but he planted his feet in the snow firmly. He grabbed one of the bombs and fired it towards the giant machine as it lunged at him.
Once Aloy realized Erend had drawn the machine away from her, she readied her bow again and scrambled to her feet. She ran out from her cover and fired off a volley of fire arrows towards the disoriented machine.
Erend fired another shot with the blast sling as she hit the Frostclaw with fire arrows, knocking the machine off balance. The ground rumbled and shook beneath their feet once it collapsed to the ground. The snow dampened the sound slightly but the sound of metal clashing against metal echoed around them.
"Now's your chance Aloy!"
"I'm on it!"
Aloy darted for the toppled machine and took her spear from her back and stabbed the chillwater unit on its chest to weaken it.
But she severely miscalculated, the machine quickly got back to its feet and swiped at her, hitting her full force.
Erend’s heart sank seeing her get bashed to the side by the machine. He steeled himself and used the remaining ammo he had to destroy the area Aloy had weakened, the chillwater unit exploded, the explosion destroying a few other components with it. He finally let out the breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding as the glowing red eyes of the machine faded and it collapsed to the ground. The ground shook beneath him once it finally collapsed.
He spotted Aloy’s fiery hair amongst the piles of snow around them and sprinted over to her. His blood pumped loudly in his ears and he tried not to freak out once he saw Aloy lying on the ground unmoving.
Erend slipped on a sheet of ice hidden under the snow as he scrambled to get to her. He lost his balance and fell to the ground hard, gasping from the pain of his own injuries revealing themselves. Despite his whole body thrumming with pain, he took a deep breath and pushed his own pain aside to help Aloy.
Erend crawled over to her, huffing in pain but he stayed strong. He pulled her towards him. Aloy clutched her side where she’d been hit, groaning from his arms putting pressure on her ribs.
“Good, you’re still with me… I dealt with the Frostclaw, we’re safe now. Anything broken?”
He was trying his best to stay as calm as possible for Aloy’s sake.
“Who needs ribs am I right?” She tried to lighten the mood despite the dire situation she’s in.
He would’ve appreciated the joke if she wasn’t seriously injured. He asked her if she could stand but she didn’t answer him, she groaned and tried to fight through the pain as she forced herself back onto her own feet. He rose with her and helped her to her feet. For once, she didn’t push him away when he put an arm around her to support her.
“There should be a couple of Sunwings somewhere nearby, I could override one of them and get us to the Bulwark. It’s my fault I got us into this mess…”, Aloy grumbled to herself.
"Don't go beating yourself up like that, we got lured into a trap by those Sons of Prometheus agents. Nobody is to blame here. Let's just focus on getting the hell off of this mountain. My beard is getting icy from being up here…"
Aloy leaned against Erend so her knees wouldn’t buckle. He was a little surprised that she didn't try to tough it out and walk on her own. Erend felt his heart flutter a little from such a simple and innocent action, Aloy was completely oblivious to it of course.
He walked slowly to ensure Aloy didn’t push herself too hard, she tried to steer him towards the Frostclaw carcass but he pulled her away from it.
“No, no, your health and safety is more important than salvaging machine parts Aloy. We need to get you to a healer first.”
Aloy knitted her brows together as she looked at him, pouting in annoyance. She tried to drag him with her but he wouldn’t budge. She sighed and gave in to his reasoning. The packed snow and the limping huntress glued to his side made the walk over to the Sunwing site quite slow, the frigid wind and snow biting at his face made the walk seem even longer. This blizzard wasn’t letting up anytime soon unfortunately, he thought that his normal heavy armor and clothing would’ve been enough for this trip but clearly he’d miscalculated. Aloy had worn her Nora sentinel armor since she knew it would be cold up here– but she hadn’t planned for a storm blowing in.
Aloy tapped on her focus with bright pink, chilly fingertips and she saw the glowing blue outlines of machines up ahead. Now they just needed to override one and get out of the mountains. Aloy took her spear off her back and held it in her free hand that wasn’t clinging to Erend. She squinted and tagged the closest Sunwing to them so she wouldn’t lose track of it in the bone white haze of snow blocking her vision.
They got down low, even though they were probably obscured from the machine's view, she hissed from the pain in her legs and back as she crouched down but she carried on with Erend at her side. She carefully approached it and thrust the butt end of her spear up against it, successfully overriding it. She let out a sigh of relief and climbed on to the machine, waiting for Erend to get on as well.
He was reasonably nervous about the idea of flying on the back of a machine in the middle of a blizzard. But he trusted Aloy with his life, which calmed his nerves ever so slightly. She looked back at him with a look that said are you ready? He hesitantly nodded and leaned forward as she did, wrapping his arms around her waist but not too tightly. She whipped the glowing blue cables that came from the machine’s neck and they took flight, he squeezed her tightly out of reflex and she gasped from the pain.
“I’m so sorry, did I hurt you?” He asked out of concern.
“A little, don’t worry about it Erend. I’ll live.” She brushed it off.
He relaxed his grip on her and rested his head against hers, shielding his face from the wind and snow by burying it in her mane of red hair. She took notice but didn’t tell him to move away, it felt reassuring to have him this close to her while she’s in pain. Usually, she never let anyone touch her except for the occasional hug from her other friends and maybe Beta, but having the subtle warmth of him pressing against her calmed her stressed out mind.
She pulled back on the glowing cables, telling the machine to fly up over the clouds. It was quite chilly now that they were above the clouds but at least they had the sun's rays to give them relief from the cold. Erend had never been this high before, he looked around in awe at the breathtaking view. The sun filtered through Aloy’s hair in a way that made her hair glow brightly, as usual he’s reminded of how gorgeous she is.
She saw the hills that led to the desert not much further and decided on a change of course. They could both use a change of clothes, medical supplies and some hot food so they were headed for the Base instead.
By the time she landed the Sunwing, Aloy's whole body was in pain from her injuries, Erend had his own share of scrapes and nasty bruises but he’d gotten lucky compared to her. She hopped off the machine and so did he. He took a moment to regain his balance after he hopped off since he’d been focusing on not falling off the whole trip back to base.
Once they climbed down the mountain side and got to the door to the base, Aloy was struggling to conceal the agonizing pain she was in. They stepped inside but before she could continue down the hallway, she felt a strong hand grab her shoulder. She turned and saw Erend looking at her with genuine concern. She tried to smile at him in an attempt to reassure him that she was fine but he didn’t buy it.
“Aloy… You don’t need to hide the fact that you're in pain. Come on, let’s get you to your room and I’ll fetch some healing supplies for the both of us. And I’ll make you some nice food if that helps.”
Erend put his arm around her shoulders and walked with her back to her room. She tried to decline the offer but he quickly shut down her protest, and having some nice food after going through all of that sounded quite appealing to her.
Before she entered her room, he reached for his belt and handed her the pouches she’d lost.
“You might wanna eat a handful of those herbs to ease the pain. You wait in your room and I’ll go bug Zo for some proper medical supplies so I can patch you up.”
Aloy gave in and nodded, taking the pouches from him as the metal doors before them slid open. She went into her room as the doors slid closed behind her, she dropped her weapons and shredded tool belt on the desk closest to the door. She looked at herself to inspect the damage to her armor, the edges of her clothes were singed and some seams had been ripped open after they’d gotten jumped by Fire Clawstriders. She’d had to take on several Sons of Prometheus operatives while Erend fended off the Clawstriders. They’d given her a beating but it was nothing she hadn’t dealt with before.
She kicked off her wet, snow covered boots and removed her damaged armor carefully so she cause herself any pain. Aloy placed her damaged armor on the desk, having stripped down to her linen pants and shirt. She clutched the side of her torso as she made her way over to her bed, groaning as she laid down on her back.
Not long after she'd shed her damaged armor, she heard the doors to her room open, followed by the sound of boots hitting the floor. She lifted her head and propped herself up on her elbows to see who it was. Erend came into view as he walked around the desk in front of her bed. He had plenty of medical supplies in his arms as he sat down next to her.
Something that immediately stuck out to Aloy was that he had taken off his armor for once. He was only clad in a loose shirt, the baggy pants he wore under his tassets and his boots.
"You probably have some nasty bruising, you took one hell of a beating back there." Erend remarked.
"I think I have a lot more than just some nasty bruising." Aloy said with a joking tone.
Erend seemed nervous all of the sudden, he placed the supplies to the side and reached out to her before pulling back.
"Something wrong Erend?"
"No, I'm all good. I just- I need to take a look under your shirt so I can take care of your wounds. I just don't wanna overstep your boundaries."
Aloy's face flushed red but she knew he was just making sure she was okay. She trusted him the most when it came to something like this so it didn't bother her.
She nodded at him, avoiding his eyes as she sat up and carefully pulled her shirt over her head. She hissed from the pain in her side as she stretched to pull it off of herself. Her chest was covered in worn cloth wrappings but otherwise, she was fully exposed to him from the waist up.
Erend was shocked and quite happy that she trusted him enough to take her shirt off in front of him. His face felt hot looking at her shirtless but he had to stay focused.
Aloy was covered in angry looking bruises on her back and her sides. She had a few small burns but they didn't look that bad. Erend gritted his teeth seeing the nasty gash on the side of waist from when she landed on a jagged rock after getting thrown by the Frostclaw.
"Give me the bad news, what's the damage?"
"You have plenty of bruises but there's not much I can do about that. You have a few small burns but they'll heal with a little bit of salve. There's this pretty ugly looking gash on your side, I'll have to clean it and wrap you up. And there's not much I can do to help your ribs unfortunately…"
Aloy sighed and nodded at him. Erend grabbed a waterskin and some spare cloth next to him. He looked up at her and made sure to meet her eyes, getting confirmation that he was allowed to touch her. Aloy noticed that he seemed to be waiting for something before she realized what he meant. She looked him in the eyes as she nodded, earning a warm smile from him in response.
He poured some water over the irritated wound to clean it, gently dabbing the wound with the cloth to get any dirt out of it and to clean off some dried blood.
She clenched her first from the pain of him cleaning the wound. Erend put a calloused hand on her shoulder and looked back up at her to make sure she was okay. Aloy was shocked by the feeling of his bare hand against her skin. She flinched from how hot his hand was against her chilled skin. It was a foreign feeling, no one had ever touched her bare skin beyond her hands and maybe her arms. While it was a foreign feeling, she didn't mind the feeling of his hand on her. Erend took his hand off her shoulder seeing that she flinched from his touch.
"N-no, you don't have to do that. You can leave your hand there."
Aloy quickly averted her eyes from him, she wanted to facepalm so badly. Why did I say that?! Now you made it weird. Erend raised an eyebrow in response to her odd plea.
"Sorry- carry on." Aloy apologized.
"I'm guessing no one's ever patched you up before? Cus you're acting like I burned you just by touching you."
Aloy gave him an annoyed look and raised an eyebrow at him, he already knew what she was about to say.
"Right- outcast, my bad. Sometimes I forget about that. I'm assuming your dad didn't patch up your wounds either?"
Aloy sucked in a deep breath hearing Erend refer to Rost as her dad… It made her think of her happier childhood memories; they'd sit by the fire together during winter. She'd sit in his lap as a kid but she sat next to him instead as she got older. Those were simpler times…
"Rost only ever patched me up when I was really little. As I got older, he taught me how to handle most wounds and then expected me to handle it myself. Some might see that as cruel or mean but I'm glad he did that."
"Is that part of why you don't like when people touch you?"
Erend rubbed her back with a feather light touch so he didn't make her flinch again while he continued cleaning her wounds. Talking seemed to distract her from the stinging.
"I suppose so. He wasn't very affectionate or big on hugs but he loved me in his own way. Not being around many people for your whole life doesn't make you very open to people touching you…"
Erend felt honored that out of all the people she's ever met, he's the only one she trusts enough to touch her. He wanted to give her a hug but he feared that might overstep her boundaries.
Once he finished washing her wounds, Erend placed the dirty, wet cloth next to him and grabbed some clean wound dressings that he'd gotten from Zo. Aloy raised her arms so he could wrap it around her torso to cover the gash on her side along with her burns. His eyes wandered over her taut shoulder muscles as she wrapped her up, he got such a close look at her thin but well trained arms and her scarred back. His face became much warmer than usual and he quickly finished wrapping her in the wound dressing.
Aloy felt an odd kind of excitement build inside her feeling of his hands just barely touching her. She had no idea what to make of this foreign sensation but she tried to ignore it for now. She could think about that when Erend wasn't in the middle of patching her up. Aloy usually didn't ask for much but this time she felt it was okay to ask for this.
"Erend? Could you rub my back again? It felt nice and my back isn't doing so well right now."
Aloy felt selfish for making such a request but Erend was more than happy to oblige.
She tried not to flinch as she felt his rough palms press against her back. She tried to lean forward to relax but she was met with a sharp pain in her side from her damaged ribs. She went pin straight, sucking in a harsh breath.
"You okay? Did I hurt you?" Erend asked with great concern.
"That was my fault… Carry on." She reassured him.
After that, he very carefully rubbed her sore back, pressing a little harder to relieve her knotted muscles. Erend quietly apologized whenever he heard her make a pained noise. Despite the occasional shot of pain, Aloy felt more relaxed than ever, her breathing was even and her heart wasn't beating at a mile a second. She hadn't noticed that she was leaning against him until he patted her shoulder to get her attention.
"Um… Aloy? You fallin' asleep on me?"
She sat up and looked over her shoulder at him.
"Sorry, I guess I was just getting comfortable. I haven't had much time to relax lately."
"Aloy, you realize you're apologizing to me because you were relaxing?
She realized how ridiculous she was being, her face flushing red with embarrassment.
"I got an idea. Since you seem to find me pretty comfortable, I'll stay with you for as long as you'd like. We'll get comfortable and I'll be your big pillow, how's that sound?"
She shifted her position so she was facing him. She didn't care about the fact that she was only in her pants and chest wrappings. She gave him that smile she only seems to do around him before giving him a quick hug.
He felt his heart flutter seeing her silent agreement. He pulled his boots off and put them to the side before scooting back onto her small bed. He got under the layers of pelts and held them up for her to squeeze in with him.
She joined him and carefully laid down on her side that hadn't taken that hit from the Frostclaw. It was a tight squeeze but being embraced in his warm, strong arms gave her a feeling of comfort and safety that she'd never felt…
"Thank you so much for doing this, Erend…"
"You know I'm always happy to help you, Aloy."