A/N: This fic follows from my personal playthrough of HZD, which means that all opportunities to spare lives were taken (not just Nil), and all dialogue options went with the heart/teamwork/positive option, with the sole exception of telling Sylens off when he finished explaining the origins of the Eclipse. It also means Aloy did and saw and collected everything, met everyone and completed every quest in the main game and the Frozen Wilds, and she did everything as early as possible (aside from clearing the last bandit camp and the entire Frozen Wilds portion of the game, which were set at specific times for reasons I'll elaborate on in this story), ergo she has all weapons, etc., and got to talk to Nil about Janeva on the way to Maker's End.
Note also that this story takes place before the credits scene of Aloy finding Sobeck Ranch; that scene is in chapter 10 of this fic. Also, having recently returned to the beginning here, I've realized that the first few chapters really don't reflect the mood of this story as a whole, things only start to get into a groove a little over halfway through chapter four; everything up to that point is just setting up the premise, basically. So, yeah, I'm not at all surprised by the lack of viewer retention this story has, and I apologize for the poor start, and for the fact that I really can't think of a way to make it better.
Midday sun beat down on the lush trees of the Jewel, the long fronds casting spiked shadows across the blue-and-gray form of the Strider that made its way down the road at a steady trot, headed away from Sunstone Rock. On the Strider's back was a flame-haired huntress, having finished her latest loop of visiting friends and allies to head all the way back to the Cut and start again.
It had been three months since the battle for Meridian and the Spire, three months since Aloy had fulfilled her destiny and purged HADES, saving the world from another extinction. She knew she was supposed to rebuild GAIA now, but Sylens had been annoyingly silent since before the battle - no matter how many times she tried to call for him, day or night, he never spoke to her again, and she needed his knowledge if she was going to figure out how to revive the AI that governed life on Earth. Sure, she probably could figure it out on her own, but why should she have to when Sylens probably already had all the answers? Though at this rate, it would be faster to figure it out herself…
She'd become a wanderer in the meantime, traveling from settlement to settlement, visiting the people who'd fought with her against the Eclipse in the final battle and all her other friends. She usually started in the Cut, where she'd talk to Aratak and everyone in Song's Edge, then meet up with others at Longnotch, then Laulai at Deep Din, check in with Ikrie at the Snowchants Hunting Grounds, and finally visit Ourea's Retreat to spend a couple of days with CYAN, asking questions about the Metal World and its people, hoping to figure out where she fit in in this world created by GAIA from the ruins and records of the past. From there, she'd head straight south to Rost's grave and check in with him, then make her way back up through the Nora settlements and visit with everyone there, Teersa and Varl and Sona and Teb and everyone else she knew. That was always the worst part, walking among people who gave her fervent glances while whispering to each other about 'the Anointed' and how she was a blessing from All-Mother, though at least she'd managed to get them all to stop bowing to her. Still, Varl was dear enough to her to put up with it, Teersa was respectful and sensible as ever, and the others were still her friends.
Then she'd go through Hunter's Gathering to see Gera and Kendert, then pass through Daytower and head for Free Heap to visit Petra. Next, she'd stop by Pitchcliff before going to Meridian, and she would stay there for a little while, spend some time with Erend and Avad and Talanah, say hello to the Sun-Priests and her many other acquaintances there, and ask around about the goings-on in the world, though it was always the same: the Machines were getting more hostile, as always, but there were no more signs of civil unrest, no unexpected causes for concern. After that, she'd stop by Brightmarket and visit her friends there, then head to Sunfall to see Vanasha and Uthid, who had turned the once-grim place into a home for the former refugees who hadn't fought at Helis's side. After that, lastly, she'd go the rest of the way south, through the Jewel, and visit Sunstone Rock to see Janeva and ask if Nil was around. She hadn't seen Nil since the final battle, but if he was going to end up anywhere, it was probably prison, though he hadn't been arrested yet. Sometimes, along the roads, she came across the bodies of dead bandits who had died to arrows instead of Machines, so she could probably assume the man was alive and still doing his thing, but she had yet to find him.
Of course, everywhere she went, everyone wanted her to stay longer, settle down and be part of whatever tribe was in charge in the vicinity - everyone wanted Aloy on their side, she was a hero to all the tribes, almost more revered than the Sun-King himself. And she wanted to, even tried, but…it was too hard, to pretend she could belong with any tribe, any settlement, knowing where she came from and why she existed. She had yet to last three days in anyone's company before insisting that she get back on the road and keep moving. More and more, she found herself taking out the pendant Rost had given her and holding it for comfort while going back through logs she had of Elisabet Sobeck, remembering her father while learning more about her mother, or so she tried to tell herself, though it was easier to do so some days than it was others…Rost wasn't really her father, and Elisabet wasn't really her mother, and when she wasn't on the road, that knowledge ate at her, so she kept moving, trying to escape her doubts.
It was hard to shake her disappointment as she left Sunstone Rock behind again without finding Nil. The man belonged in a cage, but…more than that, she wanted to see him. Talk to him. After all, as disturbing as he was, he might be the only person in the world who could-
Cries from up ahead interrupted Aloy's musings, and she pulled the Strider short, tapping her Focus. Through a hill in the road, orange silhouettes glowed, maybe a dozen or so, and Aloy targeted a couple, scanning them.
"HOSTILE HUMAN
Bandit Thug
"HOSTILE HUMAN
Bandit Heavy
"HOSTILE HUMAN
Bandit Warrior"
…and so on. There didn't appear to be any Machines, only a blue silhouette of a person the Focus didn't read as hostile to her, so they were attacking travelers. Disturbingly, though, there were a lot of them, more than in the standard wandering bandit party - since the clearing of the bandit camps, the scroungers of the land who clawed at the underbelly of society all lived together in small, mobile groups, usually four to six, sometimes eight; there was no getting rid of them entirely, but since they were too skittish to settle into camps now, the slave trade had essentially died…and there were never this many at once.
Another bandit clan, or the start of one? "Yah!" Aloy shouted, kicking the sides of her mount, already nocking an arrow as she charged over the rise. Any time she found travelers on the roads being attacked by bandits or Machines, she always intervened, doing her part to help people as she could until Sylens finally decided to show his face and help her rebuild GAIA.
As soon as she had line of sight on the battle taking place, she loosed her bowstring, sending the arrow piercing through the back of the head of a man in the tattered armor of a bandit. She managed to get another arrow off before her Strider was in the thick of it, at which point she jumped off and descended on another bandit with her spear, killing the thug quickly. From there, she focused on downing everyone her Focus would register as hostile, telling them easily from their clothes. A couple of bandits managed to fire their own arrows, but these were deflected by her Shield Weaver armor, which she always wore on the road just in case. One by one, they went down, and not all by her hand - whoever they'd been attacking was fighting at her side. She caught sight of a red feathered headdress, but didn't think much of it just yet.
When there was only one bandit left, her foe threw down his weapon and started running away, clearly realizing he was outmatched by Aloy and his previous target. Aloy lowered her bow, hoping that maybe she'd scared the bandit straight, but before the thug got five steps, an arrow hit him in the leg, and he went down, crying out. Startled, Aloy turned to the man the bandits had been targeting, and only then did she recognize the fitted white armor and exposed tanned skin, the crimson headdress and the steel-colored eyes: The very man she'd been thinking of when she'd overheard the ruckus.
Nil.
She was too surprised by the coincidence to stop him as he casually strolled over to the crippled bandit, turned him over, drew his knife, and cut the helpless man's throat while looking into his eyes. The former Carja soldier's long, deep sigh was far too contented for the situation, almost a moan of pleasure, but Aloy knew him well enough to not be surprised, though she couldn't help a shudder of revulsion. Why had she wanted to see him, again?
After a moment, once the last bandit was well and truly dead, Nil stood and turned around, his face splattered with blood. "Aloy," he greeted warmly, as though they'd bumped into each other in the Meridian marketplace. "Imagine meeting you here. You always have to spoil a man's fun, don't you?"
"I…only knew there were bandits attacking someone," Aloy stammered. "If I'd known you were their target, I would have let you have them."
"Apology accepted," Nil smiled, wiping his blade and putting it away.
"I, uh…haven't seen you since the battle for Meridian," Aloy said, gathering her thoughts. "What have you been up to?"
"Same as you, I bet," he shrugged. "Wandering the roads, looking for someone to kill that no one would miss…"
"That's not exactly what I've been doing," Aloy corrected, giving a slight, nervous laugh.
"Well, wandering, at least," he shrugged. "You must be, if you're down here in the middle of nowhere."
"I just like to keep up with my friends," Aloy managed. "And everyone else who fought the Eclipse with me. Janeva was one of them, so I stopped by to say hello."
"So she* was," Nil said, flashing his teeth, and Aloy wondered, not for the first time, if he might be sweet on his former warden.
"Why are there so many bandits here?" Aloy asked, gesturing at the battlefield. "I've never seen this many in an ambush before. Is there a new bandit clan?"
"Not exactly," Nil replied. "I had some travelers spread word that the team who wiped out the bandit clans in the Sundom split up, hoping they'd get bold. They did at first, but now they know I'm still around, so they've started traveling in bigger groups, hoping to take me out. And you," he added. "I've seen your handiwork a couple of times. No mistaking the mastery of your craft."
"I don't enjoy killing people, Nil," Aloy said sharply.
"Doesn't make the way you kill them any less masterful," he shrugged. "In any case, they want me dead almost as much as I want them dead, and their increased numbers keep me from getting bored, so it works out well for everyone."
"I see," Aloy said. "Well, as long as you're not hurting innocents."
"You know I wouldn't do that," Nil said, sounding almost offended. "It's not worth the drama." He took a deep breath, as though savoring the death that lingered over the temporary battlefield, then exhaled and smiled at her. "Well, it was good to see you again."
"Wish I could say the same," Aloy remarked. "But you always have to make it difficult."
"I won't apologize for who I am," Nil stated, and he turned to go.
Unintended though it was, those words reminded Aloy of why she'd hoped to see Nil despite his horrible nature, hitting her like a punch to the gut. "Nil, wait," she blurted out before she could think.
He stopped and turned back to her, not saying a word.
"Listen, I…I've been looking for you," Aloy confessed, already regretting this. "Or, hoping to run into you, at least."
"Have you, now?" He grinned, his silver eyes lighting up in that way that always put her on edge, like a Machine's lights turning from blue to yellow as she dove into a patch of tall grass. "Finally decided to take me up on my offer?"
"What-? No! No, Nil, I'm not going to fight you!" Aloy exclaimed quickly.
"Oh." His head and shoulders slumped, the light in his eyes winking out, replaced by overwhelming disappointment. "You're cruel, you know that? Getting my hopes up and then crushing them like this…it's almost evil."
"Not as evil as you," Aloy pointed out.
Nil sighed heavily, then lifted his head to look at her. "Well, if not to fight me, then why have you been looking for me?"
Definitely already regretting this. "I wanted to ask you something," Aloy replied, fighting the urge to get on her Strider and ride away. As unpleasant as Nil's company was, she knew she'd regret letting this opportunity pass by even more than she'd regret talking to him, considering how much she'd thought about it. And she had nothing better to do anyway, besides go through another pointless circuit…
"Alright." He squared his shoulders and spread his palms in a welcoming gesture. "Ask."
She'd spent many long hours on the road considering how best to pose her question, debating whether to go about it gently or bluntly, but now that she was actually facing the man himself, all her planning was forgotten, and she was left searching for the words. "You…"
"Yes?" he asked, raising his eyebrows.
"You…You don't belong anywhere," Aloy finally blurted, and suddenly it was coming out all at once. "You don't have a family, a home, a tribe, and you never will, never could, you could never live in any settlement anywhere, because you'll never belong. If you tried to belong somewhere, you'd just be lying to yourself, and everyone around you, anyone who really knows you would never let you near them because you just…don't have a place in the world, with anyone."
He took this in passively, his expression unreadable. When the words ran out, he folded his arms. "So, what's your question?" he asked, nonplussed.
"How do you do it?" Aloy asked, unable to keep a note of desperation out of her voice. "How do you live your life knowing you can never have a place? I mean, I know you kill people, but even when you're not killing people, you're so…calm, about everything, like nothing bothers you, the only time I've ever seen you down is when I refused to try to kill you. How can you be so…so…okay, with not belonging anywhere?"
The former Carja soldier tilted his head, pondering the question for a moment, then shrugged. "Well, it's simple," he answered: "I don't fight it. I know where I belong, I know what makes me feel alive and what I'm meant to do, and if that means my place isn't around anyone else, so be it. Trying to deny it would just make me miserable - as you say, if I tried to live a normal life in some settlement, I'd be living a lie, and I'm not too keen on that idea. I know my place in this world, and I embrace it. That's all there is to it."
"…Of course," Aloy sighed. "Right. I…should have guessed as much." Shaking her head, she turned to her mount. "Well, I should get going."
"Hold on," Nil spoke up, and she heard him take a step closer to her. "Aren't you going to tell me why you asked?"
"It's complicated," Aloy said softly.
"Must be," Nil acknowledged, and she turned back around to face him again, catching sight of his sly half-smile. "See, when you were talking about me just now, I couldn't help but notice it didn't really sound like you were talking about me at all, but rather about yourself." His smirk widened. "But that can't be right, because you of all people wouldn't have a hard time finding a place to fit in." He spread his arms, gesturing to the world in general. "Everywhere I go, your name is legend, and rightly so. You would be welcomed anywhere."
"Oh yes, I'd be welcomed," Aloy snapped, bristling at the words, and she couldn't help that she started pacing angrily. "I'm always welcomed. Hero of the tribes, favored of the Sun-King, chieftain of the werak, Anointed of the Nora." She couldn't keep the bitterness out of her voice at that last title. "Wherever I go, everyone flocks to me, everyone's always happy to see me, ranging from 'I'm so lucky to get a minute of your time' to 'Excuse me while I bow down and worship at your feet' - no matter where I go, no matter what I do, everyone loves Aloy." She stopped, catching her breath - she was all but spitting her words by now.
Nil said nothing.
"…But no one knows Aloy," Aloy said at last, her voice barely above a whisper. "None of them know what I really am. Only one person in the world knows the truth, and I haven't heard from him in months…and besides, he doesn't think of people as people anyway, I'm just a tool to him, a key to open doors he can't open himself."
"I hope you're not talking about me," Nil commented.
"Huh?" Aloy blinked. "No, no, not you. Sylens. He's…" She shook her head. "It's complicated, okay? And honestly, none of your business."
"I think it might be a little of my business," Nil said. "After all, you came to me for advice."
"And I really shouldn't have," Aloy said. "Goodbye, Nil."
"Aloy, wait," he said quickly, stepping closer to her as she moved for her mount again. "Listen, it's obvious something's bothering you, and I want to help. But I can't if I don't know what you need advice for."
"I'm really not in the habit of telling my secrets to bloodthirsty madmen," Aloy stated coldly, glaring at him over her shoulder.
He blinked, but didn't back down. "Well then, think of it as leveling the playing field a little," he insisted. "After all, you know why I don't belong anywhere, but I can't begin to guess at why you'd feel the same way. Tell me what's going on."
"Why do you care?" she demanded, turning on him.
"You're distracted," he replied simply. "Distressed, even. Being distracted can get you killed out here, and I can't let you die before me - how could we have our final battle then?"
It was an answer only Nil would give, but something about his unapologetic honesty kept Aloy from hopping onto her mount even as she turned around and placed her hands on the living metal. Instead, she closed her eyes, thinking, hesitating. She'd never told anyone about her origins, her identity, at least not the whole truth - she'd told Rost at his grave, but that wasn't the same as telling someone who could respond to her words. Her whole life, she'd been an outcast, rejected, judged, because of the mystery behind her birth, and only recently had she ever known friendship, respect, acceptance. If she told the truth-
Suddenly, she jolted, her eyes snapping open. What did it matter if Nil rejected her? He of all people had no right to judge anyone! If he thought less of her for what she was, it would mean nothing, nothing at all, she couldn't possibly be offended by what Nil thought of her!
Still…
"Okay," she said coldly, turning back to face him, "how about this: I'll tell you my secret if you tell me yours."
"I don't have a secret," he dismissed.
"What's your real name?" Aloy countered.
He actually flinched. "W-What?" he asked.
"I've asked about you, Nil," Aloy told him. "The first time I visited Sunstone Rock, I asked Janeva if she knew a hunter named Nil, since you were the one who'd told me about the place. Her response was something along the lines of 'Oh, is that what he calls himself now?' I know 'Nil' isn't really your name. So tell me what your real name is, and - and why you changed it. Tell me your secret, and I'll tell you mine."
"Nil is my real name," Nil stated. "It's who I am, not the name given to me before I even had an identity."
Of course, he had no idea how close to home those words hit, but Aloy felt the blow all the same. "I…can't say I don't relate to that," she admitted. "But you know what I mean."
For a long minute, they held each other's gaze, silver eyes and hazel locked in a silent battle, neither giving way. Then, at last, Nil sighed, folding his arms.
"When I was born," he said, "my parents named me Aren, after the first Sun-King, Araman, in hopes that I would walk in Sunlight."
"Janeva said that you were born under a long, dark shadow," Aloy said, almost as an argument.
"I was," he shrugged. "Why do you think they would take that kind of risk?"
"Risk?" Aloy blinked.
He frowned at her, then blinked and nodded. "Ah, of course, you don't know what that means. Well, they were technically risking treason by naming their child after the founder of the Radiant Line; fortunately for them, it was just different enough that they got away with it, but the risk was severe. That's how desperate they were that I might be a child of the Sun." He sighed, almost ruefully. "They were so ashamed when I became one of Jiran's best soldiers. After the war, while I was reflecting at Sunstone Rock, I realized the name really didn't suit me. I'm not of the Sun."
"You're not Shadow Carja," Aloy pointed out.
"No, but nor do I walk in Sunlight," Nil shrugged. "I'm not Sun Carja any more than I am Shadow Carja, I don't belong with those who walk in the light or those who walk in the shadows. I'm neither. I'm nothing. I'm Nil. So that's what I go by, because that's who I am."
"I see," Aloy said slowly. She thought a minute, then tested the name on her tongue. "Aren."
He flinched again, then chuckled. "You really know how to hit a man where it hurts," he remarked. He blew out a deep breath. "I haven't heard someone else say that name in so long. Hearing it now, coming from you, it almost makes me feel…lonely. Like I almost wish I could go by that name."
"I didn't mean to hurt you," Aloy told him. "I'm…sorry."
"Apologizing only makes it worse," he informed her. He took another breath, then said, "Well, that's my secret, and I've told it to you, so now you have to tell me yours. That was the deal, and I'm listening."
That had been the deal, and he'd held up his end. Aloy couldn't help that she hesitated, unsure where to begin, unsure if she could really tell this monster the truth of her identity. But she had promised… "I'm not a real person!" she blurted out.
Nil blinked. "What?"
"I was never born," she told him. "I don't have a family, I don't have a mother, I don't have a tribe. I was…created, by a machine, to serve a purpose, I'm a tool meant to do a job and nothing more."
The Carja man held her gaze for a heavy moment…until a chuckle bubbled out of his throat.
"Hey, I didn't laugh at your secret!" Aloy snarled at him.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" he said, holding up his hands, failing to hold back a smile. "I'm sorry, Aloy, I don't mean to offend. But what you said just now…it's absurd. You're not a Machine. Trust me, I know the difference between a Machine and a human."
"I'm not a Machine," Aloy conceded, "but I was made by a machine. I'm just a…a copy of a woman who lived hundreds of years ago. I can't belong anywhere because I wasn't born, I don't have a mother, I'm not from any tribe. I'm not real!"
"You're real enough to lay waste to entire bandit camps single-handed," he noted.
"Oh, forget it!" she snapped, turning away from him in exasperation. "I shouldn't even be talking to you!"
"Okay, calm down," Nil said firmly. "I want to understand, truly I do, but you're going to have to explain a little better. Just sit down, take a breath, then start over from the beginning."
"What?" Aloy turned back to him, her eyes stinging.
"Tell me the whole story," he coaxed her, his tone oddly gentle. "Take a moment to collect yourself, then tell me everything. I'll listen."
"I can't tell you everything," Aloy told him. "It would take days."
"Then tell me the important parts," Nil insisted. "Here…" Abruptly, he turned and walked over to one of the dead bandits, grabbing the body and dragging it to the side of the road, then getting another and tossing it on top of the first.
"What are you doing?" Aloy asked.
Nil continued collecting and arranging the corpses, until there were two piles of dead bandits, each three high. Appallingly, Nil sat down on one, then gestured to the other. "Sit down," he told Aloy. "Take a moment."
"I'm not sitting on that!" Aloy spat.
"You'll think better if you have a seat," Nil insisted.
Aloy was tired, moisture was collecting at the corners of her eyes, and she wanted to run away from this whole mess. But she wasn't the type to run away; her way was to face things head-on. Even when it was something that kept her up at night, wondering how she could go on now that she'd done what she was supposed to do…struggling to convince herself that Elisabet was her mother, not the original person she was just a copy of…
Sighing wearily, she walked over to a large rock that was poking out of the dense undergrowth a little ways off the road and sat down, focusing on her breathing. With a grunt of what she could only interpret as irritation, Nil got up and started dragging his corpse-chair over so he could sit on it beside her.
"Do you sleep on dead bodies?" she asked bitterly.
"No," he dismissed. "I've tried it maybe twice, in the early days after I got out of prison, but I've only killed bandits outside of war, and I'd rather sleep on dirt than on filth."
"Why am I talking to you?" Aloy asked tiredly.
"I can't answer that one for you," Nil shrugged. "But you could get on that Machine and ride away if that was really what you wanted to do, nothing's stopping you, so I can only assume you're talking to me because you want to."
Aloy shook her head.
They sat in silence for a moment, and slowly, Aloy's breathing calmed. She reached into the neckline of her armor and drew out the cord Rost had given her, pulling up his pendant and gripping it firmly; it was comforting to have someone much better than Nil to hold onto while she gathered her thoughts. That she was even considering telling the whole story to Nil, of all people, seemed unthinkable, surreal, but the more she thought about it, the more she realized that she wanted…no, she needed to tell the whole story to someone, needed to talk through it. Maybe Nil wasn't the ideal person to confide in, but…after a lifetime of being shunned for her birth, the idea of telling one of her friends the truth scared her, and not least because she knew they wouldn't just shun her - her story would destroy everything they knew about the world, tribal beliefs that kept them all going, anyone in the world would resent her for telling them the truth. Even Varl, though she'd tried to coax him into letting her show him the truth of the world, was still so hung up on Nora beliefs…and everyone else…
But Nil…Nil was someone whose resentment she could bear. If she was lucky, maybe it would even be enough for him to withdraw his challenge to a deathmatch. And really, what were the odds he'd even follow what she had to tell him, anyway?
Eventually, she looked at him, still clutching her keepsake. He met her eyes without a word, patiently waiting for her to speak when she was ready, and she reflected that he was being incredibly considerate for a single-minded murderer. She wouldn't be hurt by his rejection, and he was actually willing to listen to her…it was everything she needed right now, and even if it came in the form of Nil, she realized she couldn't pass it up. Maybe this was why she'd wanted to see him all along, and she just hadn't realized it until this moment.
Feeling slightly dizzy, she nodded.
"Start from the beginning," Nil instructed her, his tone gentle.
"The beginning," Aloy repeated distantly, her eyes glazing over as she looked off into the middle distance. "I guess that's…well…" She took a breath. "Hundreds of years ago, near the end of the ancient times, there was a woman named Elisabet Sobeck. She was one of the smartest, greatest minds the Old Ones ever knew, maybe even the smartest of them all. She…worked with a man, named Ted Faro, to build machines that helped people, made life easier, as part of Faro Automated Solutions. That's, uh, a corporation - I guess you can think of it as a tribe, but the people didn't live together…? Basically it was a group that worked together to make things people needed and then sell them."
"Sounds like the Utaru," Nil remarked. "They work to grow crops, then sell to the other tribes."
"I guess. Kind of." Aloy took another breath. "Things were…good, at first. But then Ted Faro started asking the people he worked with to go from making helpful machines to war machines - I guess there was more profit in that than the alternative. He called his creations Peacekeepers, his argument being that if the soldiers of the world were machines, then wars wouldn't involve killing people."
"How dull," Nil commented.
She shot him a glare, then continued. "Elisabet was disgusted by this change in policy, so she left Faro Automated Solutions to start her own corporation and make 'life-positive' machines. But then, one day…I don't know what happened or why, but something went wrong with the war machines, and Ted Faro lost control of them somehow. Because of the way they were designed, he couldn't override them and take back control, so they just…went berserk. They'd been designed to convert biomass - uh, living things, basically, plants and animals - into fuel, and to replicate themselves, in emergencies; without someone in control, they started doing that needlessly, constantly…they started eating all the life on Earth, and making more of themselves to eat even more, and Ted Faro couldn't stop them, no one could. It was a matter of time before all the life in the world was wiped out."
"Well, someone must have stopped them," Nil pointed out. "There sure is a lot of life around us now."
"Sort of," Aloy sighed. "In desperation, Ted Faro reached out to Elisabet Sobeck and asked for her help. She couldn't stop the machines…but she decided that she could make it so that Zero Day, the day that there was nothing left alive in the world, wouldn't be the end. She developed Project Zero Dawn, a means of stopping the machines after Zero Day and then re-seeding the Earth with life once the machines were disabled.
"She gathered all the greatest minds of the Old World together and told them her plan: to design an AI - that's, er, artificial intelligence, it's like a machine but also a person - that would spend the decades needed to find a way to shut down the war machines, then oversee the repopulation of the world. The AI was named GAIA, and it - she - would have a bunch of subordinate functions that would allow her to take care of the world that different groups of scientists would work on while Elisabet taught the main AI to think and - and feel. The function MINERVA would work to crack the code that would shut down the robots and stop them, AETHER would cleanse the poison from the air, POSEIDON would cleanse the poison from the water, HEPHAESTUS would let her create the Machines needed to terraform the world and help life return, DEMETER would be in charge of making the plants from archives of plants from the Old World, ARTEMIS would bring back the animals, ELEUTHIA would grow new humans and release them into the world when they were mature and everything else was in place, APOLLO would teach the humans about the Old World, all their history and culture…"
"What happened to that?" Nil asked.
"Ted Faro destroyed APOLLO," Aloy replied tonelessly. "He thought the knowledge of the Old Ones was a disease, and he insisted that the innocent people who hadn't been born yet didn't deserve to be burdened like that. The others thought that, if the people who came after knew what had led to their creation, maybe they would do better, but Ted thought differently, and so he erased all of APOLLO at the last minute, then killed the remaining scientists so they couldn't rebuild it. And…then there was HADES."
"HADES…" Clearly, Nil recognized the name.
"HADES was a…a killswitch," Aloy explained. "The idea was, if GAIA tried to reintroduce life to the world, something might go wrong the first time, or even the second - the plants might not grow in a way that would let the animals survive, which in turn meant humans wouldn't be able to survive…so HADES was designed to make sure things went right, and if anything went wrong, HADES would take over and…basically re-kill everything so GAIA could try again. It only existed to wipe out life on Earth, if the need arose." She shot a glare at Nil. "Kind of reminds me of you."
"I wouldn't kill everything!" Nil exclaimed, looking deeply offended. "I wouldn't want to kill everything. If I killed everything, there wouldn't be anything left to kill."
Aloy sighed, returning her gaze to the middle distance. "Anyway…apart from APOLLO, obviously, everything worked out, the scientists managed to create GAIA and her subordinate functions, and then…everything died. Until a few decades later, when MINERVA cracked the code and shut the Peacekeepers down - that's what the Spire was for, by the way, it was one of the beacons used to shut down the war machines across the world. Then…well, I don't know if HADES was ever used, but eventually life came back, just like Elisabet worked so hard to accomplish. Plants, animals…people. Not just the tribes we know, but all over the world, people were raised, and then released, knowing nothing, thanks to the destruction of APOLLO. And things went fine for a while, until…about twenty years ago, when something happened. Somehow, something…woke, HADES, gave it its own separate consciousnesses, I don't know what or how. But given its own consciousness, HADES sought to wipe out life on Earth again, since that's what it was made to do. GAIA couldn't let that happen, so she chose to self-destruct, hoping to take HADES with her. But she knew that, without her, eventually things would go out of control. You've heard of the Derangement, right? That's because GAIA isn't around anymore to tell the Machines not to be aggressive. Eventually, everything would fall apart, so she needed someone who could destroy what was left of HADES, then rebuild her so she could take back control. So…in her last moments, she…she took Elisabet Sobeck's…genetic material, whatever that means, her - her remains? Her essence? I don't know…her gene print, whatever old-world doors scan for to identify who's trying to get through them. GAIA took Elisabet's, and from it, she created a…a baby, a human baby, who had Elisabet's gene print, a copy of Elisabet. And she left it for one of the tribes to find and raise, so one day it would grow up and find the Master Override, destroy HADES, and bring GAIA back."
"And that baby…was you," Nil said softly. It wasn't a question.
"Yes," Aloy whispered. "I'm just a…a copy of Elisabet Sobeck, created to serve a purpose. GAIA left a message for me, but she called me Elisabet, it didn't even occur to her that I might have a different name, because I'm…I'm not a real person. Just a copy." She shook her head, squeezing her eyes against tears. "And now I've done it. I purged HADES during the battle for Meridian, at the Spire, and now…I'm supposed to rebuild GAIA, but I need Sylens's help, and he hasn't said a word to me since before the battle. In the meantime, I…have nothing. No purpose, and no family. I could look for Elisabet, but I don't know where to start, so I have nothing." She chuckled bitterly. "I have nil."
Nil gave a strained laugh of his own, and Aloy turned to him, trying to read him. He met her eyes, but at least he looked somewhat shaken.
"So that's it," she told him. "I'm not a real person, I'm just a copy of someone else, made by machines to serve a purpose and nothing more."
The former soldier shook his head. "Alright, give me a minute," he requested. "This is a lot to take in, let me…sort it out a little. If anyone else told me that story, I'd think they were lying, but…you've always struck me as honest. Direct. You wouldn't make something like this up. So I…need a minute to sort through it."
"You think you can sort it all out in a minute?" Aloy asked.
"No," he shrugged, "but a good soldier knows how to compartmentalize. I just…need a moment, to stow it all away to think about later."
"You…" Aloy swallowed, amazed that he wasn't yelling at her. "You don't hate me, for telling you all this?"
His brow furrowed. "Why would I hate you?" he asked. "I asked you to tell me the whole story, and that's what you did; it might not have been a story I was prepared for, but that's not your fault. I just need a minute, that's all."
With that, he closed his eyes, his expression tense. Aloy could only stare at him, dumbstruck, needing a minute herself; she'd been so prepared for him to resent her, his casual acceptance almost stung.
"Okay," he said at last, opening his eyes again, and he focused on Aloy. "Alright, so, let's talk about the important part."
Aloy braced herself for what Sylens would say - that this was all so much bigger than her not having a place, that she was whining about the circumstances of her birth like a spoiled child when the whole world was depending on her existence.
But to her surprise, Nil instead said, "So, you're this woman, who made everything? Elisabet?"
"I…" Aloy blinked, gathered herself, then answered, "I'm a copy of her."
"So you know what she knew?" Nil asked. "You're everything she was-?"
"No, no," Aloy elaborated, "I don't have her memories. Just her…her gene print, whatever that is."
"Was Elisabet a huntress? A warrior?" Nil asked. "I thought you said she hated war…unless she just resented that she wasn't going to get to go out and fight herself anymore?"
"No!" Aloy exclaimed. "She was a scientist, she hated conflict and she wasn't a soldier. In fact I…I don't think she ever killed anything, at least not on purpose. From what I've gathered, during ancient times, even meat was…grown, food was provided to everyone without killing animals or anything."
"Did she have your skill with a bow, or a spear?" Nil pressed.
"I don't know if the Old Ones even used bows or spears," Aloy said. "I feel like they probably didn't."
"Well, then you're not a copy of her," Nil said, as though it was that simple.
"I was made from her gene print!" Aloy shouted. "I might not know exactly what that means, but - look, when a door made in the ancient times scans me, it says I'm a 99.47 percent match to Elisabet Sobeck." Noting Nil's quizzical look, she hastily explained, "From what I've gathered, 'percent' was a measure used by the Old Ones to calculate…ratios, I guess? It was a measure out of a hundred, so ninety-nine percent is ninety-nine out of a hundred, and I'm more than that. Basically, half of a hundredth of me is different from Elisabet Sobeck. That's nothing!"
"That depends on which half of a hundredth of you we're talking about," Nil shrugged.
"What?" Aloy asked, bewildered.
"Well, think of an arrow," Nil said, drawing one from his quiver. "Say you have an arrow that's made entirely of wood." He shrugged. "Pretty useless, right? Oh, it'll inflict flesh wounds just fine, but once it hits armor, or bone, it'll be turned back - if you don't hit your target in just the right spot, it's not going to do much. But, now say that half of a hundredth of that wooden arrow isn't made of wood, but of steel." He raised his eyebrows.
"That…still sounds pretty useless," Aloy remarked.
"It does," he nodded, "and it is…unless, the half of a hundredth in question just so happens to be…" He lifted a finger and tapped it against the point of the arrow. "…the point. The very tip. If the very tip of the arrowhead is the part that's made of steel, well, that's all the arrow needs. The rest is just so much vessel to get it where it's going."
"I'm…not really sure it works like that," Aloy said.
"Sure it does," Nil insisted.
"I mean, I guess I see what you're trying to say," Aloy conceded. "I guess. So…if I'm the arrow, then what part of me is the tip of the arrowhead?"
"Well, look at the arrow again," Nil said, and he ran his free hand along the length of the arrow he held. "The shaft and the fletching, that's most of the arrow, but none of it's the important part, it just lets you send the important part - the arrowhead - where you want it to go. So the shaft and fletching, I'd say, that's your body, your flesh - it's made of the same stuff as anyone else, it's nothing special and nothing remarkable. The arrowhead, the important part, is your heart, your mind, your spirit, whatever you want to call it - it's what's inside you, what makes you more than just so much meat. Now, you say Elisabet made machines? Maybe that's why you can tame them…"
"Oh, thanks," Aloy scowled. "Thanks for taking one of the few things I thought I could claim as my own and pointing out that it probably just came from her-"
"No, no, you're missing my point," Nil cut her off. "Your ability to tame Machines, the intelligence to figure it out, that might come from her, but that's not the tip of the arrowhead, it's just your potential. I mean, what's an arrow without a point? Just so much potential. It's the tip of the arrowhead that takes it from potentially deadly to actually deadly."
"I'm still not following," Aloy groaned.
"Aloy, the tip of the arrowhead is who you are," Nil stated. "Not what you could be, not your ability to be, but you. Not your ability to think and feel and learn, but the things you do think and feel and learn - your memories, your experiences, your thoughts and feelings, your skills, your choices."
Aloy stared at him.
"Now tell me," he said after a moment: "do you have those things in common with Elisabet? Have you experienced the things she experienced, did she experience what you have? Have you done the things she did, did she do the things you've done?"
"…No," Aloy croaked.
"Then I would say that the half of a hundredth of you that's different from her is the half of a hundredth of you that matters," Nil concluded, putting the arrow back in his quiver, though his eyes never left hers. "Aloy, it's your legacy that I know, and that's not hers. You are the warrior who killed Helis single-handedly, the finest huntress and soldier I've ever seen, tenacious as a Thunderjaw and twice as fearsome - anyone under your protection can rest easy, and anyone who invokes your wrath should count themselves lucky to witness even one more sunrise. None of that has anything to do with a woman who lived hundreds of years ago."
Aloy closed her eyes, taking this in. "How…how do you know?" she whispered. "How do you know that's the part that matters?"
When she opened her eyes again, she saw his teeth flash at her. "Because that's the part that leaves a man when he dies," the former soldier answered confidently. "Think about it - a person's body doesn't vanish when death claims them, it's the spirit that goes: their thoughts and feelings and memories, everything that makes them who they are, fading away, and then gone. The body's still there, but it's just potential, not important, an empty husk."
"Of course," Aloy sighed. "Why would I expect anything else from you?"
He shrugged, offering no apology, and she felt doubly foolish for expecting one. What was especially disturbing, though, was that she couldn't honestly say he was wrong, even if the context he was citing was repulsive. She wanted to argue, but couldn't find a valid argument to throw at him.
Silence reigned for a long minute, interrupted only by the occasional whinny of the Strider still standing in the road.
"Now, you came for me for advice," Nil stated at last, "so I'm going to give you the best advice I can think of: find what makes you feel alive, and embrace it."
Aloy blinked.
"What makes you feel alive, Aloy?" Nil asked, leaning closer to her. "What gives you that rush, that sense of belonging, as though you know why you're here and you're doing what you're meant to do in this world? Not what anyone else says you're supposed to do, I'm not talking about why a machine made you; what I'm talking about isn't something that can be assigned or forced, it's something you feel, a sense inside of you that can't be given or denied."
"Well, I don't get it from killing people," Aloy told him sternly.
"Okay," he nodded, "that's a start. What, then?"
She thought.
"Maybe killing Machines?" he suggested.
"No," Aloy replied. "I mean, I…I used to feel powerful when I took down a Machine, it was…fulfilling, I guess. But now that I know the Machines are what help keep this planet alive, that they're part of GAIA, I…I don't like killing them, when they're not corrupted. I feel guilty when I have to, even if it's to save my life; I try to override them when I can."
"Well, then that's not it," Nil sighed. "It can't be something that conflicts with or goes against any other part of you."
"You do realize you just admitted that there's no part of you that doesn't like killing people?" Aloy asked pointedly.
"Sure," he shrugged. "You know that about me, and so do I."
"Ugh," she groaned. Why am I taking advice from this man? Why am I even sitting here talking to him?
"But you do know what I'm talking about, at least, don't you?" Nil pressed. "That feeling, you know it, right?"
"Yeah, I…yeah, I know what you're talking about," Aloy acknowledged.
"Well, then you've felt it," he stated. "It's not something you can understand if you haven't felt it. So what makes you feel that way?"
She thought, trying to sort through memories to find something that she could reliably say made her feel alive. It wasn't easy, or simple - she couldn't find a pattern in her memories, couldn't even say for sure she accurately remembered times she'd felt that way.
"Okay, try this," Nil said at last: "think of the first time you ever felt that way. Relive that whole memory, out loud, and let's see what we can figure out from there."
"What makes you think I remember the first time?" Aloy asked.
Nil smirked. "Everyone remembers their first time," he said confidently. "I remember my first kill as though it was yesterday."
Another grunt of disgust worked its way out of Aloy's throat.
"Come on," Nil coaxed. "You've already come this far, told me this much, you might as well follow through at this point. If you don't follow through, you won't make the kill, everyone knows that."
"Would it kill you to not compare everything to fighting and killing?" Aloy demanded.
He shrugged. "It's what I know."
Aloy sighed heavily, but nodded to show that she was going to try to dig up that memory. She thought back, hard, going back earlier and earlier in her life, until…until she found a memory of a rush like nothing she had known prior to the day she experienced it. It was almost uncanny, how easily it stood out once she had it in her mind's eye.
"Found it?" Nil asked. "Tell me. Relive the whole thing, maybe we can find where you belong."
"I…was six years old," Aloy said softly, remembering. "I'd run away from Rost, the man who raised me…I was an outcast at birth, because I didn't have a mother, and motherhood is sacred to the Nora-"
"It is?" Nil spoke up abruptly. "Well, that explains a lot."
"Huh?" She turned to him.
"All this talk about how you don't have a family, how this whole being-a-copy thing means you're not a real person…if you were raised to believe that having a mother and being born is sacred, it explains why it upsets you so much," he said.
"Yeah, there's nothing more important to the Nora than motherhood," Aloy told him. "Mothers speak for generations - the Matriarchs of the tribe are grandmothers, who speak for two generations, and the High Matriarchs are great-grandmothers, who speak for three generations or more. And the High Matriarchs' word is law."
"Huh," Nil mused. "Interesting system."
"Yeah…anyway." Aloy took her Focus off, staring at it, remembering. "I'd run away from Rost - he was an outcast too, and he raised me, but I wanted to see the local village. Children were gathering berries, being praised by their mother, and…I wanted to be praised too, so I picked some berries and offered them to her. She told the children to come away from me with her, that I was an outcast, to be shunned. I…got upset. Their rejection hurt…"
"And yet you don't understand that your refusal to duel me hurts me," Nil remarked.
She glared at him.
"Sorry, sorry," he said, raising his hands. "Carry on."
"I ran away, crying, and I tripped and fell into a big hole in the ground," Aloy continued. "Luckily, there was water at the bottom to break my fall, but I was trapped in a cave; I called for Rost, but he couldn't hear me, so I swam out of the pool, then started searching for an exit, and before long, I…I found the remains of structures made of metal. I'd…stumbled across some ruins of the Metal World. A little ways in, lying on the ground, there was an ancient corpse, that had this little piece of metal stuck to its head." She blinked, other memories catching up with her. "Well, not this one, Helis destroyed the Focus I found that day and this is just a copy Sylens made for me, but a Focus."
"Focus?" Nil asked. "Is that what you call that thing?"
"It's not what I call it, it's what it is," Aloy corrected. "This device is called a Focus. I didn't name it, like you named your bow."
"Okay," Nil said. "Anyway, go on."
"I…I was curious, so I took it off the body and put it on my head, in the same place it was on the corpse, just behind my right eye," Aloy remembered out loud, getting lost in the memory again, "and suddenly, I could see things, things that…I hadn't been able to see before. Lights, everywhere, I didn't understand but…I could see." Aloy shook her head slightly. "Somehow, I…I'd found a relic of the Metal World, something from the Old Ones that worked, and did things. At first, I was frightened, but as I kept searching, seeing all the lights, before long, I…I didn't want to leave anymore. I knew I should want to - Rost told me from the beginning how anything from the Metal World was tainted, corrupted, forbidden…but…something about the place just…felt right. It felt like…"
"Like home?" Nil supplied.
"No," Aloy responded, "not exactly. It was more like…like where I was supposed to come home from, the place I was supposed to go when I wasn't home."
"Huh."
"I started exploring - to find a way out, I told myself, but really I just wanted to see everything in there. I felt so alive, uncovering every corner of that place that I could reach as a child, finding memories, voices left behind by the Old Ones, even an image of one made of light, a man in strange clothes saying happy birthday to his son…I was happy, so happy, happier than I'd ever been before. I didn't understand what I was hearing at the time - looking back on those voices now, I realize they were recording their last moments as they waited to die - but it felt like what I was supposed to do, to see it all, to be there and learn what no one else had." The memory faded, and Aloy replaced the Focus on her temple, then sighed heavily. "But of course it felt right," she mumbled. "Elisabet was of the Old World, so of course it felt like where I was supposed to be."
"I thought you said this happened when you were six," Nil said pointedly. "And that you didn't find out about your birth until just before the battle for Meridian. You couldn't have known that the ancient world was where you were from, or where you belonged."
"Not consciously," Aloy said. "But subconsciously, I must have known, because I'm her…"
"But you don't have her memories," Nil reminded her.
"Do you have a better explanation?" Aloy asked.
"I might," he replied, surprising her. "Something you said got my attention: that you were raised being told that places from the ancient world were forbidden, that you weren't allowed to go there. See, if I could hazard a guess at where you belong, it's that you belong where you're forbidden to go. It seems like every rule, every expectation, every chain anyone tries to tie people down with, you just shatter them all, like bones under a Behemoth's hooves. I was told odds of surviving the battle for Meridian were next to impossible, but we all survived! And we did it because you got us through it. You do the impossible, Aloy, you break all the rules and defy all the odds. Maybe that's where you belong."
"I don't break all the rules," Aloy scoffed. "Some rules exist for a good reason. Like not being a murderer."
"But you do break plenty of them," he said, either ignoring or not noticing the slight. "It seems like, if someone tells you you can't do something, that's exactly what you do. You go where you're not supposed to go, survive when you're not supposed to survive and kill what you're not supposed to be able to kill. You killed Helis! It wasn't even one-on-one, he brought, what, half a dozen of his men to the fight with him, against just you?"
"More like four," Aloy muttered.
"Still," Nil insisted, "you do the impossible. So maybe that's who you are."
"It was who Elisabet was," Aloy said bitterly. "That's why GAIA used her genetic material to make a baby. 'Elisabet, I know you too well. Somehow, you will find a way. In you, all things are possible.'"
"Well, if you have that in common with Elisabet, so be it," Nil dismissed. "I still say your potential isn't the same as your identity. And maybe Elisabet could do anything, but did she? Did she go out in the world and explore forbidden places, fight impossible battles, kill unkillable foes?"
"No," Aloy sighed. "No, she worked in an office and created impossible machines. Or…" She blinked, thinking of CYAN. "No, that's…that's not quite right. AI existed without her, she just…"
Nil smiled.
Aloy shook her head. "I'm not sure you're right," she told him. "Maybe you are, but…I don't know."
"Well," Nil said, "I can think of somewhere you could go where you can find out."
"Huh?"
"Somewhere no one's allowed to go," Nil explained, a gleam in his silver eyes. "Somewhere almost no one's ever returned from, and those who did didn't live long after they made it back. A place of unknowns, of the ultimate impossible odds of survival."
"The Forbidden West," Aloy said softly. "Beyond Sunfall."
Nil smiled. "You've thought about it," he noted.
"Yeah, I…I've thought about it," she admitted. "I mean…how bad can it be out there? GAIA and her subordinate functions seeded the whole world with life, equally, why would things be stable here but…not out there? And also…" She looked down, her eyes burning. "I think…I think maybe…wherever Elisabet called home, there's a chance it's out there somewhere. If I went that way, maybe I could…find her." She glanced at Nil. "Have you thought about going out there?"
"Of course!" he exclaimed brightly. "Who hasn't? Me, I've always wondered at the stories of the people out there, tales of savages - not like the Nora, real savages. I've always wanted to pit myself against them, wondered if they bleed red, too…get that same look in their eyes…" His voice went deep and passionate as he gazed off into the distance dreamily.
"I'm sure they do," Aloy sighed. "Any people out there were part of ELEUTHIA, just like you. But they're also probably part of tribes, just like the tribes we know…though I bet they have their own bandits, too," she admitted.
When Nil looked at her, his eyes were glowing. "I've always wanted to go out there," he told Aloy. "New kinds of people to fight and kill, impossible odds of survival-"
"Then why haven't you?" Aloy asked sharply.
Nil frowned, then shrugged. "Well, first I was a soldier for Jiran," he replied. "Then I was a prisoner at Sunstone Rock for two years. Then I started hunting bandits, and not long after that, I met you. By the time all the bandits were gone, and there was nothing left around here for me to kill, I'd already found how I wanted to go."
"In a duel to the death with me," Aloy sighed.
"Exactly," Nil grinned. "To fight you one-on-one, to die by the same hands that killed Helis…there could be no higher honor, no greater joy. I don't want to die out there, I want to die by your spear."
"I'm not going to fight you, Nil," Aloy stated firmly. "Ever. It's not going to happen."
"It pains me every time you say that," Nil sighed dejectedly. "But, I can't help but hold out hope you'll change your mind someday."
"If I haven't changed my mind by now, I'm not going to change it," Aloy informed him.
"Well, a man can dream," he said. Then he shrugged and added, "Besides, I get to see your masterpieces sometimes. That's worth sticking around for. But if you're going to head to the Forbidden West, well…I have no reason to stay here, do I?"
Aloy narrowed her eyes at him. "Nil, what are you saying?" she asked.
He flashed a smile at her. "Aloy," he said, "if you go to the Forbidden West, may I go with you?"
"Why?" Aloy asked.
"We're partners," he replied, "and I can't let you die before I do. Granted, if there's anyone who could survive out there, it's you, no question - as I said, you do the impossible, always. But…your odds might be a bit better if you don't go alone. Let me watch your back."
"So you can stick a knife in it?" Aloy retorted.
"I wouldn't do that!" Nil protested. "Aloy, if I kill you, it's going to be in a fair fight, looking you straight in the eye as you defend yourself with everything you've got. There's no challenge in an underhanded kill, no thrill, and besides, the finest warrior in all the tribes deserves a better death than that. I swear, Sun's honor, I would never kill you unless you agreed to a one-on-one duel and I somehow managed to overpower you." He smiled. "And we both know that wouldn't happen."
"I thought you didn't walk with the Sun," Aloy challenged. "Why should the Sun's honor mean anything to you?"
"Well, what do you want me to swear by?" Nil asked. "It's not like I've got many things I can take an oath on…"
"Swear on that bow you're so fond of," Aloy told him.
"Okay," he shrugged, readily drawing his bow and holding it out. "Aloy, I swear to you, on the Voice of Our Teeth, I would never harm or kill you except in a fair duel that you agreed to."
The fact that he hadn't even hesitated was almost comforting - if he was that sure of it, he was either an excellent liar, or he really wouldn't hurt her unless she agreed to his challenge. And though he wasn't a good man, if there was one positive thing she could say about him, it was that he was an honest one; he didn't make excuses for who he was or what he did, not even when excuses were offered to him, he was always straightforward and direct. Even so… "I'm…not sure I'm going to go west," Aloy said.
"Well, then where will you go?" he asked her. "What will you do, Aloy? You're still not sure who you are, where you belong - I can see the doubt in your eyes, it hasn't gone away. And I can't blame you, clarity doesn't come in a single afternoon. Speaking of which…" He glanced upwards, and Aloy followed his gaze to note that the sky had already turned to a dark blue, the last few rays of the sun ebbing away. "It's getting late."
"I can see that," Aloy sneered. She shook her head. "I can't believe I spent a whole afternoon talking to you…"
"I didn't force you to," he pointed out. "You chose to talk to me."
"I know," Aloy sighed, her head sagging.
"Where will you go, Aloy?"
She heard Nil's question, but didn't answer, thinking hard. It had always been there, at the back of her mind, the questions she had about the Forbidden West, what could possibly be out there that was so horrible given that GAIA controlled all of it…whether or not her mother might be out there. And…maybe she did also partly want to go there specifically because it was forbidden - people had forbade her from doing things all her life, and maybe she did get a sort of satisfaction out of defying them. She thought of her time in the Cut, trying to run away from her destiny while she found herself, but what she had found had only helped some, and she hadn't been able to stay because the world had been depending on her. But…her mother might be in the Forbidden West, none of the tribes had any influence out there, and she wasn't needed here anymore. Even if she died, Sylens could rebuild GAIA without her, and surely he would - if the Machines kept getting more and more deranged and the world fell apart, he wouldn't be able to keep researching the Old Ones, right? But she wouldn't die…
A day and a half earlier, the corrupted audio log she'd found in the ruins of GAIA Prime had been restored, and Elisabet's words about her hypothetical daughter were fresh in Aloy's mind: "I would have wanted…her, to be…curious. And…willful - unstoppable, even."
I am curious. And I am unstoppable.
It all fell into place, and Aloy lifted her head, drawing in a deep breath as her determination settled.
"Looks to me like you've made a decision," Nil observed.
"I have," Aloy said, and she stood up. "I'm going to go to the Forbidden West."
"May I go with you?" he asked again, rising from his macabre stool at last.
Aloy glared at him. "I'm faster on my own."
"Please?" he all but begged. "Come now, you've already broken my heart once, don't break it again and leave me behind. Please take me with you."
She considered it, weighing the options in her mind. She had always traveled alone, but if Nil just wanted to die out there, he might as well join her, like he had for the bandit camps they'd raided together… "If I do let you come with me," she said at last, "it'll only be because there's no one else whose life I'm okay with risking."
"I'm okay with that," he assured her readily.
"Then…" She sighed, unable to believe the words that were about to come out of her mouth. "…Fine," she spat. "You can come."
"Thank you," he told her, grinning as he stretched languidly. "Let's go!"
"I'm not going now!" Aloy all but laughed.
"What?" he asked. "Why not?"
"Nil, I have friends," Aloy said. "People who care about me-"
"People who don't know you?" Nil asked slyly.
Aloy flushed. "Just because they don't know what I am doesn't mean they don't deserve to know where I'm going and get a chance to say goodbye," she said. "They don't know the person they care about, but they do care, and…I can't just leave them without telling them I'm leaving. Don't worry," she added, "I won't tell them about you."
"On the contrary, do tell them about me!" he objected. "If they care about you, it might set their minds at ease to know you're not going out there alone."
"And if I tell them about you, should I refer to you as 'Nil' or 'Aren'?" Aloy challenged.
"That's up to you," he shrugged. "You know my secret, as I know yours, so they're ours to do with as we will."
"That wasn't part of the deal!" Aloy exclaimed. "I never said you could tell other people about me!"
"Well, you can tell people my secret if you want," Nil said.
"Okay, but you can't tell people mine," Aloy told him furiously.
"Fine," he shrugged. "Just as long as we understand each other. I'll wait for you on the road to Sunfall, okay? Take your time, you've…given me a lot to think about."
With that casual reminder that she'd just shattered a man's entire worldview, Aloy backed off. "I'll be a while," she said, gentling her tone. "My friends are…all over. But I'll save Sunfall for last, so…I guess I'll see you there."
"I'll see you there whenever you're ready," Nil smiled at her, and she finally vaulted up onto her mount. "And, Aloy?"
She looked down at him, poised to kick her Strider into motion but holding for a moment.
"There's a bond between us now," he told her; "the bond of shared secrets. That's a rare and powerful thing."
"Don't make this weirder than it is," she told him. "Please."
"Just stating a fact," he shrugged.
She sighed. "I'll see you on the road to Sunfall, Nil."
"See you there," he nodded.
Aloy nodded back, then leaned forward on her mount. "Yah!" she shouted, kicking her heels into the Machine's sides, and within moments, she'd left the bloodthirsty warrior behind, unable to believe she'd actually agreed to travel to the Forbidden West with him by her side. Already, she was trying to convince herself that everything about this plan was a terrible, horrible idea, and she should reconsider all of it.
But she could already tell, she was set on this path, and wasn't going to turn back. Not even where Nil was concerned.
And THAT is why the scene of Aloy finding Elisabet comes after this, and why this story is going to be AU when HFW comes out! This isn't a one-off, I'm going to write my own version of the Forbidden West, a full exploration story. I'm probably not going to play the canon Forbidden West when it comes out, since I don't intend to get a PS5, and nothing short of a reveal from Guerrilla that we'd even have the option of having Nil in the game would change my mind (which won't happen, since the player has the option of killing him in HZD, though come on, if there's one person who would end up out there besides Brin, it's Nil!), so this is going to be the next best option for me; I hope it will be for you too, reader. Gear up! :D
Oh, also, minor disclaimer…apparently "Aren" is a thing on Urban Dictionary; I didn't know that when I gave Nil his name, I just had a dream in which it was revealed that that was his name and I went with it, I only even know it's a thing on Urban Dictionary because I Googled it after I had said dream. There's no other reason behind his name here.
*Yes, I know Janeva's gender is never stated in HZD, and it's considered likely that they're actually trans and therefore male, or at the very least nonbinary. I promise to address this later, specifically in chapter 8.
