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When the gangplank dropped to the dock with a soft clack, sailors began to unload crates of cargo. A crate stacked full of machine parts clattered onto the dock, raucous laughter rang out from somewhere on the upper deck, the clap of hands and cheers as the expeditions were finally reunited.
Aloy stood just outside the noise, arms crossed over her chest, back straight. Her eyes were sharp as she searched each face that appeared from the depths of the ship, searching for one in particular. She politely nodded at a few familiar faces as they passed by her—Rokomo, Theoa, Otosu—but her attention stayed on the open space by the gangplank.
Then she stepped into view: Seyka.
She wasn't armored today—just wrapped in a sleeveless travel tunic, a rucksack slung over one broad shoulder, and her sword and bow strapped to her back. Her hair had grown even longer since Aloy had last seen her, nearly reaching her lower back even in its customary ponytail. A breeze caught the end of her tasseled scarf and snapped it outward like a bird's outstretched wing. She looked tired, sun-kissed, and satisfied.
Aloy's breath caught in her throat at the sight of her, memories and emotions flitting through her, feeling like a bird fluttering its wings within her chest. The early morning sun framed Seyka from behind, casting the ghost of a halo around her head as she waited for her turn to disembark.
Beautiful. She was so, so beautiful that Aloy's chest ached with it.
In her distraction, she almost wasn't prepared for their eyes to meet across the dock.
"Aloy!"
Seyka thundered down the plank, feet striking the dock hard, a laugh floating light and free over the crowd of Quen, until she stopped right in front of Aloy. Seeing that smile again after so long apart, now just inches away, sent a startled flicker of warmth through her bones.
"Hi," Seyka breathed, the quiet tone of her voice in stark juxtaposition with her unrestrained joy from a moment ago, though her eyes still seemed to glow with warmth as she looked upon her.
Aloy was trapped in that gaze, with those eyes seeming to blaze a molten gold in the light of the sun.
"Hi," she managed, though her voice came out rougher than she had intended. She cleared her throat and tried again. "You look— I—" words failed her, slipping away in the same current that rhythmically lapped against the hull of the ship behind them. She drew in a deep breath in time with the creaking wood, her nerves refusing to settle.
Instead of words, she reached out with a shaky hand—a moth drawn to a flame—only to draw back, the emptiness a physical ache trapped within her ribs.
Except, Seyka caught her hand in one of her own.
And with it, she gently tugged Aloy closer and closer, until she was folded within an embrace so achingly tender that the corners of her eyes began to sting with unshed tears. She burrowed deeper into Seyka's embrace, tightened her hold on the other woman until Seyka squeezed her back just as tightly, as if she was trying to fold her into her very being.
She turned her head, greedily memorizing the nearly silent gasp Seyka let out at the brush of Aloy's nose against her throat. The light kiss she pressed there next startled her just as much as it surprised Seyka.
Aloy almost regretted the action as Seyka jerkily pulled out of their embrace, but before that feeling could take hold, a sailing-roughened hand cradled her jaw, tilting her chin up to meet that dark gaze once more. Seyka's long fingers curled around to the sensitive skin at the back of her neck and her thumb gently swept across her cheekbone. Seyka held her like she was something precious, something to be held close and protected. The look in Seyka's eyes somehow softened to something gentler, something warmer, something molten, as a soft smile began to curl her lips. A smile that Aloy found herself beginning to compare to the sunrise. She found herself smiling back.
"Can I kiss you?"
"Yes."
As if there was any universe in which Aloy would possibly say no to that.
Their noses brushed together, impossibly gentle, and then Seyka's lips were on hers. It was barely a kiss, more like a shared breath, but it somehow meant more than any words could say.
A new feeling seemed to click into place in the space surrounding her heart, almost like it had been there from the very beginning. Something that Aloy knew had to be love from the way it stole her breath away, just like the emotion she could see shining back at her in Seyka's eyes from behind dark lashes.
Falling in love with Seyka was inevitable, Aloy thought, like the sun rising in the east or pollen in spring.
She found herself swept into another hug, Seyka's nose tucked into the curve of her shoulder and neck.
"I missed you, Sunwing."
That stupid nickname, whispered so reverently into her skin, like it was a prayer, a wish, and a promise, all rolled into one—Aloy knew there was no other way her story could end, except here, in Seyka's steady arms, basking under the sun of this woman forevermore.