"Shepard," a voice whispered, slowly opening my eyes to see Aloy nearly at eye level with me, already dressed, crouching down next to my bed. I yawned, covering my mouth, before I sat up, rubbing my eyes. "Erend might already be downstairs waiting for us. We really need to move quickly."

"Just let me get dressed."

As I stood up, I noticed her look at me up and down for a moment as all I wore was underwear. I actually felt myself blush for a moment as I quickly got dressed, putting on my boots last of all. She sat down on her bed, surprisingly wide awake, watching me tie up my boots. No doubt just those were strange for her compared to the simply footwear she wore. Grabbing our things, we headed downstairs to find Erend waiting for us. There was no doubt he was nursing a hangover, but he was still with it enough to greet us both brightly. After wishing us good morning, he immediately told us of his idea.

"Okay, so you and Shepard head to Rockwreath and find Olin, get the answers you want. From there, you need only head west back to Red Ridge Pass. That's where her body was found. I'll be waiting nearby for you. I'll head out of Meridian tomorrow morning."

"Why not join us?" I wondered.

"Because the moment I see the bastard, I'll want to kill him. Bad enough what's happened to my sister, but to hear one of my best friend's has sold me out…"

"Aloy, I've been putting together a layout of the area, something I did back east, if you know what I mean." She nodded, understanding immediately. "So I reckon, if we push ourselves, or find ourselves mounts, we're looking at mid-afternoon arrival. We find Olin, camp overnight, and we meet you at some point tomorrow. Does that work, Erend?"

"It's fine with me, long as I have some help with all this."

I glanced at Aloy. I was on board to help the man, clearly stricken with grief and wanting answers. If it was a simple answer, at least it would put his mind to rest. Aloy looked at him before she turned her eyes to me. She nodded once.

Thanking us before wishing us good luck, Aloy and headed straight for the bridge leading back into the so-called tainted lands. It took a few minutes to break through the crowds continuing to line up for entry, and more than one person recognised us and wasn't too happy about us being allowed entry and now obviously departing. Considering Erend now had the help he wanted, I figured they wouldn't be waiting too long.

Across the bridge and walking up a hill, we passed an enormous quarry within an hour or so, amazed at the fact such an enormous hole would have been dug out of the earth with nothing more than manual labour. Half an hour past the quarry, we agreed to look around, trying to find mounts to make our day at least a little easier. It took some searching, as we had to avoid some of the bigger machines that Aloy figured she couldn't override.

Some of the machines I saw for the first time beggared belief, beyond imagination. I was left thinking that whoever had created them seemed to know of the animals that had once prowled the land, but while some were obvious examples of things like bulls, gazelles, horses and other regular animals, I was left thinking some harked back to the time of dinosaurs. And having to explain all that to Aloy… so I didn't bother for the time being.

Finding a pair of machines we could finally ride, it was a pack of five, and as she got to work, I scared one of them off by firing my pistol in the air, but the other thought charging at me would be a good idea. Not wanting to waste more bullets, I find high ground and tried a bow and arrow for only the second or third time. I certainly lacked the skill Aloy had shown but was amazed at how effective such a simply arrow could be against these machines at times. Fire at the right time, at the right spot, and they went down just like an elk or a deer would have done when I was hunting with my father.

"Still not good enough," Aloy stated as I returned wearing a grin, which disappeared as soon as she said it, "That first one, two inches down and you would have disabled it immediately. That second one, you wasted at least two arrows." She took one of the arrows from my quiver. "While not as precious as your bullets are, as I know you have a finite amount, making arrows constantly isn't fun, Shepard."

God, it felt like being told off by one of my old superior officers. "I'll… er, use my bow more and try and get better."

"Practice makes perfect, Shepard." She met my eyes and offered a slight grin. "I have had years of training. You were frozen a long time, correct?"

"Yeah."

"Plus you are good with that rifle of yours."

"Thanks."

"Come on. Quicker we get to Rockwreath, quicker we get the answers we seek."

As we rode along, I slowly understood why the Nora would consider these lands tainted. Unlike the Sacred Lands, which was filled with lush green fields, forested full of flowers and animals, cool streams with fish, and was generally a pleasant place to live, the other side of the mountains was harsh, warmer, much of it barren with little vegetation, and a reminder of certain other areas of the old United States.

Aloy spent most of her time looking around as I did. We were both alert, ensuring we circled around any pack of machines that might have taken an interest in us should we approach too closely, but most seemed to ignore us. While they were hostile, they didn't actively chase after us. Or, at least, those we passed by didn't. I had a feeling we'd been lucky so far.

I checked my map at each crossroads and fork in the road, making sure we took the right path each time. Aloy seemed to trust me with that each time as I told her left or right and she just turned where I said to go. She was away with her thoughts the rest of the time, no doubt mulling over in her mind what she was going to ask of Olin… and then perhaps thinking what she was going to do with him. I had a feeling that, before finding out he had a family that was being held hostage, she would have interrogated then killed him. Knowing he was a victim of whoever he was working for, no doubt these Eclipse we had heard mentioned briefly… I think her mind might have changed.

It was mid-afternoon when I called out, letting her know that I was confident it was close. We led our mounts off at least a hundred metres away before dismounting. It was likely they would have disappeared by the time we had were done. There were a few paltry lookouts that we managed to avoid, finding a ladder we could climb up. What we found beggared belief.

Aloy had told me that Olin had explored ruins of the Old Ones. But this was no ruin. This was an excavation site, nothing like even the quarry we had passed earlier that day. It was what they were excavating that sent a chill down my spine. Gently grabbing Aloy by the shoulder, she turned to look at me and my face was likely a picture. It would have been a mixture of two emotions anger.

Fear at seeing more of these machines being dug up, and anger at the utter stupidity at digging them up. No idea how or why they were buried, but Aloy recognised Olin immediately, making a gesture in his direction. The others we didn't recognise, but she used her Focus to count them up, and we were outnumbered possibly ten to one. Not good odds.

"What are these idiots doing?" I hissed.

Aloy had no response as we watched the one obviously in charge manage to wake up the Corruptor. Because of the noise, we couldn't quite hear what was being said, so we had to rely on body language, and even we could see that Olin wasn't particularly comfortable at seeing old machines being woken up. Aloy and I would certainly have plenty more questions for Olin now.

Then something bizarre happened. There was a loud screech that even we heard, Olin and most the cultists around us crying out. We shard another glance, wondering what was going on. Then, as our Focuses were still linked, we heard a new voice.

"Forgive this intrusion, Aloy, you left me no choice," the voice said.

"Who is this?" she asked immediately, though quietly.

"An interested party. Now their Focuses are disabled, but I don't know for how long. The rest is up to you and your new friend." She glanced at me, so I guess he could see us, or he was someone who was privy to plenty of information.

"Who is this?" Aloy demanded. But even I heard the line disconnect.

"Aloy, we need to stop them now. You want Olin alive, correct?" She nodded. "Okay, so we have the high ground here, so we keep it, but we can move, circle around, keep them guessing. Stay in cover, aim for the green barrels. Even I recognise that as Blaze now. Kill the humans first, then we'll focus on the machines."

"Bow?" she wondered, her own already in hand.

"Humans? Yes. Corruptors? You can use a bow, I'm using my rifle. But…"

"But?"

"I'm running low on mags. Um… magazines. This thing here," I pointed to where the bullets were chambered, "I've only got half a dozen mags left. Plenty of bullets in each, but if we keep fighting these dickheads, and they keep raising machines…"

"So bow for humans, rifle for machines?"

"Well, yeah, that's what I was thinking…"

"So what's the problem?" I gave her a look to see a slight grin on her face. "You're not actually that bad with a bow, Shepard. Probably better than half these idiots."

I felt like I had to prove it, probably her way of motivating me or something. Or maybe she did genuinely think I'd be better than them. Hunting humans was different to hunting game, but they seemed to realise that we were not there in number, so grew over confident very quickly, not taking cover like they should, leaving themselves exposed. Aloy… never missed. Half the time, I had an arrow nocked, ready to fire, and whoever I was aiming at was already crumpling to the ground with an arrow sticking out of them instead.

It wasn't easy work, and took far longer than if I just shot them with a couple of bullets, but I slowly but surely gained confidence with each arrow I fired. I just used the training I'd undertaken when joining the army and just changed the rules for rifle usage to that with a bow. It generally worked. Things like wind mattered no matter what you were using.

Once there were few cultists left, I dropped the bow and took out my rifle, making sure I had a full magazine chambered before turning my attention to the Corruptors. The fact these idiots were raising them from the dead had me internally shaking my head in disbelief. Did they not realise what they had done so long ago?

But, to my relief, I'd learned that although they were still incredibly dangerous, when working alone, they were not the horrific threat they'd once been. Sure, I felt more confident with a rifle than a bow, but Aloy certainly showed no fear taking on a machine that had cut swathes through us a thousand years ago with no more than a bow and a spear.

And she looked graceful while doing it.

Every machine had a weak spot. A Corruptor had at least two we'd learned. Aloy and her fire arrows weakened them quickly, and if they kept firing, they would eventually overheat, exposing the cooling rod. So I basically stood up and waved at one of them. "Oi, fucker!" I called.

It turned my way and immediately fired, running and ducking behind cover. As soon as it went silent, I stood up and drew its fire again. Doing that for a couple of minutes worked a charm, as I eventually heard a hiss as it stopped moving. With rifle already raised, the cooling rod stood out like a beacon in a dark room. Aiming for it immediately, the Corruptor almost blew up straight away, fire enveloping the machine. There was no way it was going to do anything else, immediately switching to the second Corruptor Aloy was dealing with. She had been doing the same thing, almost taunting the thing.

Opening fire from a different angle, the Corruptor was suddenly very alone in the world, and we easily managed to make it overheat. I gave Aloy the pleasure of sending a fire arrow straight into the cooling rod. She sent two for good measure, just to be sure. As that sank to the ground, the first Corruptor practically exploded. Certainly gave me a good chuckle as I jogged back towards Aloy. Soon as I was by her side, we went looking for Olin.

We found him cowering inside a shelter, grabbing him by the collar and dragging him out. He looked at me first, no doubt wondering what I was wearing, and I did wonder if he recognised the weapon in my hands, but his attention was then definitely taken by Aloy, who had the tip of her spear at his neck. Looping the rifle around on my back, I crouched down next to the clearly frightened man. Bald and stocky, he was no warrior, that was for sure.

"Okay, Olin, my friend here is going to ask you some questions. I would suggest you answer them honestly, lest you find that spear buried somewhere you really don't want it."

He nodded eagerly. "I'll answer any questions you have."

"Good." I stood tall over him. "Aloy, he's all yours. I'm going to check some of the bodies, see if we can't find more information in addition to whatever our new friend has to tell us."

As Aloy began interrogating him, fear dripping off the words of every answer he gave, we learned plenty. This group was called Eclipse, confirming the name we'd heard before, though they were apparently a group called the Shadow Carja. I could already figure out what they were, some sort of splint faction from the Carja at Meridian. Probably a long story behind it that we'd learn later.

When he mentioned a devil they worshipped called Hades, that grabbed my attention. My father, being a history teacher, had always been interested in the old mythology's. Greek. Norse. Roman. Mostly the old European, and his interests had naturally passed onto me, well, some of them. But I remembered him as the god of the dead and king of the underworld. The fact the Eclipse revered such a name sent a shiver through my body. It did not bode well.

I kept an ear out as my own search was proving rather fruitless. We learned the name of the leader of the attack on the Nora, a warrior by the name of Helis, so that was a name to keep in the memory for later. Apparently he had quite a few epitaph's. Terror of the Sun. Stacker of Corpses. Champion of the Mad Sun King. Fantastic, I thought. Just the sort of foe we need. A lunatic digging up old machines.

Finally, he mentioned somewhere called Maker's End. No idea where it was, but he immediately gave us directions, which suggested it was going to be a long journey again, one we'd have to prepare for. Aloy had a few more questions of a personal nature before I returned to her side. The way her hands held the spear… I wondered if she wasn't just going to end him.

"What would you do?" she asked.

"You're asking me?"

"I cannot be… objective in this decision, Shepard. I want to kill him but I hesitate because… I know he has a family, and that they were taken from him. But does that excuse everything he's done?"

"In a manner, it does. It's a question of how far you would go to ensure you could see your family again. If you kill him, that would be it, you would feel better, but you would leave a wife with no husband, a child with no father. If you let him live," I met his eyes, "Then he will spend the rest of his days ensuring he makes up for his mistakes, no matter how they were made, but we will show ourselves to be merciful. Certainly compared to those he worked for."

She removed the tip of the spear from his throat. "Thank you, Shepard. I would not have said the same thing. I would have killed him and be done with it. All those lives taken. I still remember watching them die. They may have hated me for what I was, but they were still my people." She crouched down to meet his eyes. "We will help you, Olin. You have caused much destruction, but I can also see you are a victim in all this too. I cannot imagine what rests on your conscience and soul right now. Tell me where your family is and we will ensure their safety. Then you will take off your Focus and you will leave. Disappear to safety. I think that would be best."

"Of course."

He described where his family was being held. It was a fair distance. "Okay, we have things to do, Olin, but we will sort your issue before heading to Maker's End. Shepard, can you put the location into your map?"

"Yep, that's easy enough."

He got to his feet and looked at me. "I know who she is. Who are you?"

"To you? A stranger. Someone who just assured you're still breathing. That's all you need to know."

"Of course. I didn't mean to pry. It's just… your weapon…"

"Do you recognise it?"

"Not quite, but I have an idea where it's from." He met my eyes. "But I know when to keep my mouth shut."

"Good. While we mop up here, I think it's best you grab your things and make your way."

We waited until Olin climbed out of the pit and disappeared before Aloy and I performed one last cursory check, taking into account the clothing worn, noticing the emblem all of them were wearing, suggesting there was some sort of organisational structure. But apart from maybe a few supplies to scavenge, we made our way out of the dig site at the same time. It was growing dark by now, so we headed in the direction of Red Ridge Pass, stopping at the first campsite we found, checking there were no machines in the vicinity before lighting a fire.

As usual, there was a log to sit on, sipping at my canteen, Aloy with her water skin. It had been another long day, realising we hadn't eaten since breakfast, so no wonder we were both starving by the time we had a chance to relax. Once our appetites were sated, we sat together simply taking in the view and the stairs, Aloy shuffling a little closer as it grew colder.

"Meridian was noisy," she finally said.

"Compared to where you grew up, of course it was."

"Were your cities that noisy?"

I couldn't help chuckle at that question. "I'm still getting used to how quiet the world is nowadays. Our lives were one of constant noise. All the vehicles on the road and the endless traffic, planes in the sky, homes full of appliances that made all sorts of noise. Then there was the entertainment, whether it was watching television or movies, or playing games, or listening to music… Society at large was a cacophony of noise, Aloy. I'm not sure anything that exists in this world could possible compare."

"Do you miss it? Your world?"

"I'm not sure I miss it. I know, like everyone else, I took everything for granted. Simple things like having hot, running water for a shower. Or walking into a supermarket to buy food ready to eat."

"Supermarket? What's that?"

"I'll put it very simply. It was a place where we used to go buy food. Remember those stalls in Meridian selling produce, fruit and vegetables?"

"Yes."

"Well, a supermarket was like that just… a lot bigger. It would boggle your mind. Things like that, you don't realise how easy it made life until it's gone."

"But you used to go hunting, yes?"

"I did, with my father. But that was for… well, recreation. Don't get me wrong, we didn't just kill it and leave it there. We made use of the animal, but nothing like what you would likely do nowadays. You hunt to survive. Our world wasn't really like that. If we wanted meat, we'd go to a supermarket, or a butcher. That was a place that usually only sold meat products."

"That's what I'm not getting. You had all those things yet we don't. What went wrong?"

"I guess that's what we're going to find out eventually." I paused before asking, "Who was that voice?"

"No idea. That's the first time anyone has communicated with me via my Focus." She sighed, shuffling a little closer. "Just more questions, Shepard. I knew this wasn't going to be easy but this is something else. I spent all my life training for the Proving. This is beyond my expectations."

"Doing alright so far. Sure you'd be doing just fine without me here."

"Maybe… but… I like having you here."

"Well, that's something, at least."

"I'd hate to spend all these nights alone. It would feel rather lonely after a while. All that time I spent training, it was only Rost and I. Never really had a chance to speak to anyone my own age. And when I finally had the opportunity, it was taken from me. I could have made friends, at least with some people who would have finally accepted me."

"So… I'm your friend, am I?" That made her look at up at me, and she seemed a little… hurt… "Sorry, that was a poor attempt at humour."

She shuffled closer until I had no choice but to move my arm to rest around her. "Never thought I'd meet an Old One," she whispered, "I still have a lot of questions."

I laughed as I knew she would. "Well, I'll answer any you have as honestly as I can."

Waking early the next morning, Aloy suggested, after checking the map, that walking to meet Erend shouldn't take too long, perhaps meeting him within a few hours. I didn't mind either way, used to walking or marching everywhere, as despite the fact we'd been highly mechanised, even during the battle against the plague, the army still made us march.

Erend was waiting for us where he said. What we didn't expect was finding him under attack by machines. Figuring I should start using a bow more often, I had that out alongside Aloy, and while I won't say we made short work of the machines, the fact the three of us spread out and fired from different angles left them more confused than I thought they should be. Once they were down, Erend took a deep breath, immediately thanking us for the timely arrival.

His first question wasn't a surprise. "So, you kill him?"

"No. We let him live, and we're going to help get his family back."

"You are?"

I could understand the surprise, no doubt assuming wanted vengeance. I like to think she'd taken my gentle warning I'd given before arriving in Meridian to heart. "I think you should help too, Erend. I think you two need to speak about what happened."

"You seriously think that's a good idea?"

Aloy nodded. "I had plenty of reasons, good reasons, to want the man dead but I chose a different path. You might hate the ground he walks on, but I believe he owes you an explanation for what happened."

He gave it some thought. "Okay, since you're helping me with this, I can at least listen to your advice about that. When do you want to handle that?"

"Soon as we're done with whatever we're doing here."

"Okay, we should get to work then. Follow me, the attack site is nearby."

As we walked, he explained the situation, what he thought happened to Ersa. When he described what they did to her body, he had to stop more than once, clearly a wound but also the source of his anger. And he burned with vengeance, but unlike Aloy, I had a feeling any advice would be ignored. He was looking for and wanted blood in return. I did wonder how far he would be willing to go to exact his revenge.

The attack site was in the shadow of a nearby hill. On top I could see the rusted remains of what were obviously satellite dishes. No point trying to explain what they were to either Aloy or Erend. Some of what he said didn't make a lot of sense, but the reason for an attack on her did. Being the one to team up with the new Sun-King, forcing out the old king's followers after he was killed would certainly set off the situation we currently found ourselves involved in.

Then Aloy asked the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question. "Why would Ersa come all the way out here? It's a long way from Meridian, particularly doing so in the middle of the night."

"I don't know, Aloy," he muttered, "That's what I intend to find out."

Aloy soon had her Focus out, looking for evidence. Didn't need one myself to figure out something. No battle had taken place at this location. Sure, there was evidence of something. The blood on the ground suggested something untoward had taken place, but there were no bodies to start with, as they'd been taken away already, but I would have expected to find any vegetation around us to be trampled, arrows everywhere, and other signs that suggested that Ersa and her people had either been taken completely by surprise and slaughtered where they stood, or had fought to the last man and woman.

Then Aloy made a suggestion that even had me looking at her in surprise. "I think there's a good chance they were not killed here. Shepard, does it look like an ambush took place here?"

"Honestly, no."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Erend asked.

She walked away and crouched down, pointing at the ground. "Look here," she said, gesturing for us to join her, before she gestured away, "These are wheel tracks. Maybe a cart of some kind. But these are recent." She stood up and put her right hand over her eyes. "And there's definitely a blood trail leading away too." She turned to Erend. "This isn't what it seems. There's something else going on here."

"But what?" he asked.

"I can't be sure. But I think following these cart tracks might provide the answers you seek."

"Okay," Erend stated with what I would call a determined nod, "Let's follow them and see where they lead."