Any and all constructive feedback is greatly appreciated, even if it is just a cheeky thumbs up. They often help me get motivated to write and update.
I've drafted several chapters ahead but I'll try and keep my updates semi-regular.
Thank you for taking the time to read this and I hope you enjoy this story.
Chapter one.
The Sobeck Ranch.
Aloy looked over the body leaning sideways on the bench. She placed her hand on the chest of the suit, her Focus gave her a glimpse of the woman's face. It was her own. The name and rank was not however.
Doctor Elisabet Sobeck PHD. Alpha Prime.
A tear ran down Aloy's cheek as she stepped away from her body. It was identical in everyday, her weight, her height, her eye colour and hair was all the same. Genetically identical in every way.
She still didn't know if Elisabet was really her mother or not but was it okay to feel a connection to her? Was Sylens right to say she has two mothers even? A child, at least to the Nora Tribe was of her mother, of All Mother. So maybe it was okay to be of Elisabet, of a machine.
Something small in Elisabet's had caught Aloy's eye. It was a small spherical object. She looked at Elisabet's face once more, asking for permission before taking it into her own hand and looking at it. There were triangle shapes both pointed up and down as well as round shapes either side of them but the edges were jagged and there were little dots of varying sizes her and there.
Aloy scanned it with her Focus by holding it up by the chain and it naturally spun around in the dusty wind.
A globe. A spherical representation of the Earth with a map on the surface.
The Globe stopped spinning as Aloy held the object in her hand, the Focus then scanned one of the larger shapes on the surface, the Focus told her,
A continent comprising of the northern half of the American Land mass, connected to South America by the Isthmus of Panama. It connects Canada, the United States, Mexico and the countries of Central America.
The wind suddenly picked up and suddenly the tears in Aloy's eyes were from the dust blowing in her eyes. The sky turned darker and Aloy looked around for some shelter. There were rough shapes of walls and a collapsed roof still standing, Maybe she could huddle down in the remains of the old building since even after eons it was still standing.
Her Focus picked up something else however a short distance away from the building, in the ground. Aloy made her way over to it and began to dig and brush aside the earth enough to begin to reveal a shape of a hatch. Eventually she pulled the door open and Aloy could just about see a floor and it seemed reasonably sturdy in there. Aloy dropped down and landed on a soft pile of soft silty sand, it twisted her ankles a little but it was not dissimilar in there to other Old ones places.
Inside, Aloy shut the hatch door shut behind her. The sandy air filtered through onto her shoulders as she flicked her Focus on to give her enough light to see around her.
There was an old workbench to the far corner of the room and Aloy walked towards it, using the dim blue light of her Focus to see. Aloy flanged over the tools scattered across the bench, she had seen similar in Sylens' workshop, and again in Meridian where the Tinkers worked on objects from the Old World. The Focus scanned long since faded pieces of paper pinned to the walls and some scattered on the wall. The device was downloading something but as the circle turned to uncover the information, Aloy picked up something buried in the dirty dust on the side.
The Handle was interwoven with synthetic textile and metal, it was light and flexible but as she lifted the object higher, the end uncurled and spanned at least 8 foot in length.
A Bullwhip. Formerly used by cattle drivers and teamsters.
Intrigued, Aloy stashed the coiled whip onto a clip on her side, just as the data competed downloading onto her Focus.
A diagram of a person riding on the back of what looked like a Strider but it wasn't a machine so it must be a Horse but the person was sat on something which seemed to enable them to control it. Aloy zeroed onto the seat on the back of the Horse and her focus downloaded another diagram of the seat called a saddle.
Suddenly, a wave of tiredness swept over her. It had been a long few days with the wake of the Battle of Meridian still fresh on her mind and Aloy felt a cold weight in the pit of her stomach when she thought about how she had just left straight after. It has become too much so… She had left.
The wind hadn't let up outside, "Looks like I'll be spending the night here then." Aloy mused to herself. Aloy looked around for a place to lay her head for the night in the basement. Her Focus picked up something else rested on the side of some broken furniture. She saw a cube hologram with her Focus and the datapoint downloaded.
"It's bad Mom. Really bad." It was Elisabet, sneaking to an older woman.
"You can contain it though, right. Ted must have come to his senses –"
"He did but it's too late."
A men stepped forward, similar in age to Elisabet's mother, "Too late? So that means, that's it then? There's no hope?"
"No. I mean yes it's too late but I have a plan. A horrible, horrible plan. It would mean we have to give up on the world as we know it but it could mean that we would still have a future."
"What, like human popsicles the news keeps talking about? Are you planning on freezing peoples they can thaw out once those machines stop –"
"No Dad. That wouldn't work, it's not a realistic or doable plan. Maybe if we had years to play with but we have months –"
"Elisabet." Her mother said, "What do you plan to do?"
Elisabet lowered her shoulders, her face looked pinched and tired. "I'm going to kidnap the greatest minds on this Earth. I'm going to make them design, and make a terraforming AI which breaks the Turning Act so it can think and act for itself. I'm going to preserve a selection of fertilised eggs and seeds for the world's flora and fauna and tell the AI to birth the eggs when the planet is safe and ready for them. I'm going to tell those scientists the truth of our imminent death, give them the option of work themselves to death or euthanasia."
After a long pause, her mother asked, "And Ted?"
"I'm going to make Ted pay. Literally. He's bankrolling the whole thing, he caused it the Faro Plague, and he can pay to fix it."
"I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall for that conversation, Liz." Her father mused, he looked at his partner beside them and they shared a look.
"There's a place for the families of the people on this project. It will be a safe place for them to live the rest –"
"Liz." They said in unison.
"I was born here. I want to die here, with your mother."
"Save our spots for people who might have to choose between their spouses or their kids, honey. We've lived good lives and raised you; our pride and joy."
Elisabet gasped and closed her eyes as she bowed her head, "Mom, Dad, I don't know if I can."
"Use that brain of yours to fix this problem, we always knew you would change the world Liz. Serve life, not death. Heal this world and do your best to stop this happening again, so that someday, in the future, no one will have to face this problem again. Or make this choice again." Her mother said. "Please remember though, you are not alone on this one. If I know you, like I think you do, you already have a few names for people who would be the first ones to ask to be on this project. You weren't the one to have many friends but a few good and close ones."
Elisabet, still with her head bowed down, nodded.
"Well then, remember. They, like you are going to have to make these decisions, make the same sacrifices, leave what they hold dear behind also. Lean on them, trust them. You are not alone. Don't let them feel like that either, okay." Her mom finished.
"Kiddo, I never thought we'd get grandkids but the more I think on this, we're gonna get a few million more than even I hoped for." Her dad said with a chuckle, after a moment, they all laughed.
"They're not all going to be mine, dad, none of them will be –"
Her dad enveloped Elisabet in a hug, "Just give me this one, okay."
The hologram ended as they all embraced.
Aloy didn't get much sleep that night.