I don't remember falling asleep. I realized this as I opened my eyes with hesitation, expecting to be greeted by a wild animal or worse, a machine. Through my blurry vision and in my half-sleep state, I guessed it was just after sunrise based on the pink and orange glow coming from the slivers of sunlight that crept into the room.

Room? I blinked a few times, the ceiling coming into focus before I took note of the soft bedding beneath me. I didn't sleep in the wild last night. I'm in…Meridian? This was Olin's old house. Avad had given it to Aloy when-

Aloy.

It all came back. My trek from GAIA Prime to Meridian, harassing that city guard for information, tracking down Erend in that bar – all of it had led up to me coming back to the house, where Aloy found me hours later.

As though on cue, the bed creaked as weight shifted from the far edge to where I was. I grinned and gave a quiet laugh as the memories settled. Right.

She wrapped an arm around me and rested her head on my chest – wisps of her disheveled hair tickling me as it brushed against my face. Her voice was clear, like she'd been awake for a while. "What's so funny?"

I kissed the top of her head. "Nothing. Was just…thinking about last night."

Aloy was quiet as she began to trace random patterns on my stomach with her finger. When she didn't say anything, I spoke again. "Having fun?"

She stopped and let her hand rest on my bare skin. "Sorry." She said something else, but the words came out muffled.

"What?" I asked.

Aloy glanced up at me, her eyes practically shimmering in the early dawn light. "Was it…better?"

Huh? I was still waking up and not much registered clearly at the moment. "Was what better?"

She bit her lip. "The other place. Wherever they sent you while you were there."

Oh. I frowned and shook my head. I had told Aloy everything about the weird simulation Branwell had put me through. She hadn't said much at the time, but I could see now that it was bothering her. "It was never real. I don't know how the hell they did it, but it was all a lie."

"That doesn't answer my question." Her words made my heart ache and my throat tighten.

No. I wasn't going to let that bullshit get in the way of us, not after everything we'd been through. "Hey," I said, rolling onto my side and facing her. I reached out and pulled her close to me, our foreheads touching. "No, it wasn't 'better'. Not by a longshot. The entire time I was in that…thing, I couldn't stop thinking about you. It wasn't obvious at first because the simulation kept trying to trick me, I think, but as soon as your name came to me, I snapped out of it."

I swore I heard her breath hitch, but Aloy had composed herself before I could notice it for long. "But you saw your family and-,"

I stopped her. "My parents? Dennis? They're gone, Aloy. So is…so is Jenna. You were there – you saw." The tightening worsened, and I found myself having to blink back tears. It had been a while since their deaths had gotten to me and it had only become more painful to think about since being in the simulation.

"I know," she whispered.

I wasn't about to let her feel bad for something she couldn't control, something she had done nothing but help me get through ever since I woke up from cryo sleep. "Then you know that the only person that matters to me more than anything right now is you." I kissed her forehead. "You're my family. Okay?"

Aloy gave a short nod, the corners of her mouth turning upward just enough that I was able to relax a bit. "Okay." She pressed her lips against mine – the kiss brief and with soft hesitation. "I missed you, Becks. I tried to get you out of there – tried to break into GAIA Prime, but…I couldn't do it." She sounded disappointed in herself, but I could also hear traces of defiance in her voice. It was almost like she was…ashamed? This whole ordeal had taken a toll on us, definitely, but I got the impression that Aloy wasn't used to "losing" when it came to trials or obstacles in her way.

"It's all right," I declared. "I'm fine, you're fine, and we're here now." I didn't want to go through this again, honestly. We were together again and that was all that mattered. As far as I was concerned, everyone else could go fuck themselves. "Also," I added, "no offense, but this has to be the crappiest 'good morning' I've ever gotten."

Aloy smirked, and I let out a sigh of relief when I heard the teasing in her voice. "Sorry," she said. Without warning, she reached around me and rolled over, taking me with her in one swift movement with me ending up on top of her. I barely had time to react before she strengthened her hold on me and kissed me again, her tongue dancing with mine – reigniting the fire that burned with such intensity the night before. I shuddered as her hands grazed up and down my back, quickly realizing how difficult it was to keep up with her as I was still waking up.

She pulled away slowly, moving a hand to push some of my hair out of my face. "Was that acceptable?"

I tried to laugh, but in my breathless state it came out sounding more like a horse snorting which led to Aloy giving me a strange look followed by the two of us bursting into laughter.

"Yes, very," I answered once we'd finally calmed down. My stomach rumbled loud enough for her to notice.

"Hungry?"

I nodded. "I've just been eating whatever I could get the last few days. Be nice to get some real food."

"I have some here. I'll go hunting later if we need more."

Later. Her words reminded me of what Erend had told me the day before. I rolled off Aloy, settling beside her. "Aloy…Far Zenith – what did they build?"

She sighed, and I wondered if perhaps I shouldn't have said anything just yet. We'd only been together again for a few hours and here I was bringing up the shitty organization responsible for separating us for a fucking month. "North of the city, on the top of the cliffs there, where we found AETHER – they used machines to build some kind of bunker. It's finished, but it's heavily guarded." She shook her head. "I think…I think they knew I would try to stop them."

"A bunker? A bunker for what?" This didn't make sense. Far Zenith had control of GAIA Prime. They'd used it as their headquarters for a couple months at least and it seemed to work fine for them. Unless…

"Fuck," I breathed, sitting up.

Aloy sat up as well. "What? What is it?"

I turned to her. "HADES. After I…woke up, I tried to escape but they threw me in a jail cell instead. Your friend, Sylens, was there."

Aloy's eyes widened. "Sylens?"

"Yeah. He helped me escape." I took a deep breath. I knew she wasn't going to like what I was about to say. "Aloy, he…he's had HADES this entire time. And he traded it to them for a copy of APOLLO!"

Her eyes flashed with anger as she clenched her fists. "That-I can't…what was that bastard doing there in the first place?"

I put my hand on her arm. "He wasn't exactly eager to share information."

"Sounds like Sylens," she said with a roll of her eyes. "But why would Far Zenith want HADES? What do they want with GAIA? And why did they take you?"

"Branwell and the other crazies there believe that GAIA failed when the cradles created new humans. They want to have control over how the earth is repopulated." I swung my legs over the side of the bed and scanned the room for my clothes, which I found in a convenient pile on the floor a few steps away.

Aloy's brow furrowed in confusion as she stared straight ahead. "But...how can they…?" She stopped, her expression quickly transitioning from puzzled to horror. "HADES," came her realization. She turned to me. "MINERVA."

"Activate the Faro machines and have them only destroy the humans," I said, the words feeling weird as they left just from the sheer insanity of it all. "It must be a manual override, but I think they've been having trouble getting it to work properly, otherwise they would have done it by now."

"And the…simulation?" I saw her discomfort as she pronounced the word. "What's the point of that?"

I threw the tunic on and began working on my pants. "Still not sure. Something about how the process might take a long time and they want to use it on the people that are still in cryo sleep." I fastened the pants. "I think they were testing it out on me."

"Where are these people? The ones still in cryo sleep?"

"No idea," I said before taking a seat on the bed next to her. "And I have no clue how we can stop them." If that's even an option, anymore. My thoughts surprised me but only for a moment as I recalled my musings the previous night. I sighed. "I don't even know if it's worth it, honestly, Aloy."

She blinked a few times, obviously caught off guard by what I said. "What? How can you say that? Of course it's worth it."

Wasn't this enough?

I met her gaze again. The frustration and anger that had manifested last night came out again. "Is it? Is it, really? Why?"

"We didn't get GAIA working again just so these people could ruin everything, Becks!" She stood up and started getting dressed.

That hit a sore spot. Just get away from all of it – all of them.

"No. I didn't get half my fucking body blown up just so I could risk getting the other half blown up, too! These people are dangerous, Aloy. We walked into their trap and they got to test out their stupid simulation for a fucking month. Now they have HADES and…and I don't-I don't think we need to be here for that." I lowered my voice - looked away from her. "I don't want to be here for that."

Once Aloy had finished getting dressed, she turned to me, hands on her hips. "I don't understand, Becks – you'd rather the world end? Because that's what they want."

"We could have our lives back. Not this…whatever the hell this place has become."

"I don't know!" I exclaimed, shaking my head. "I don't know. It's not that simple-,"

"Oh yes, it is," she said, cutting me off. "If you walk away – if we walk away, they will figure out their plan and they will use HADES and everything will be destroyed!"

A dark room. His skin – rotting, reflecting the flickering purple solid-state lighting. Ashes floating down, the fire raging below.

"SYSTEM DETECTS LIFEFORMS APPROACHING." Red light.

No. I glared at her, not caring that it was Aloy I was talking to. No, I was too angry for this shit. "Since when do you care, Aloy? What the fuck have these people ever done for you? Cast you out? Treated you like dirt? Like a nobody? Shit, fucking Avad wouldn't even help us stop Ted and he won't help us with this either." I stood up. My hands were shaking. "You're not responsible for the world because someone else fucked it up." I knew I was out of line – that I was being unfair. Aloy had every right to be pissed at me for my behavior, especially after everything I knew she'd been through.

And oh, was she pissed. She didn't raise her voice, but her quiet, assertive tone held enough weight in it that I could practically see the anger emanating from her. "We both know the reason I'm here is because someone fucked up the world, Becks. Your civilization is gone but for some reason your people keep trying to end the world."

"What? You can't blame me for what Faro did! Or Branwell!" I began pacing back and forth next to the bed.

"You're incredible…"

"I'm not, but you can't stand there and tell me you want to just walk away from all of it? Just give up and let everyone die-," she said.

I didn't want to hear anymore. I spun around and used my left fist to smash through the closest wall, letting out a scream of rage. The wood panels easily broke apart, sawdust and splinters crumbling onto the floor. A decent-sized hole now graced the impact spot.

We stood in a shaky silence for what seemed like forever until Aloy finally spoke. "Becks…"

I stared at the wall before slowly turning to face her again. The anger had dissipated – released in my violent outburst – but there was something remaining, something I'd pushed away for longer than I should have.

Grief. Guilt. Regret. The simulation had been fake - I knew that, but I admitted that a part of me desperately wanted it to be real.

"It would have been better."

"I'm…I'm sorry. I can't, Aloy. I just-how many more times are we going to risk our lives before we stop getting lucky?" I held up my hand, now covered in superficial scrapes. A fine dust from the wall coated the blue light plates on my arm. "Look at this and tell me if it's still worth it."

Her anger was gone as well – replaced as she stared at me, sadness filling her eyes, saying nothing. Instead of giving her a chance to respond, I grabbed the spear and pack I had acquired on the way to Meridian and gave her one more longing glance before making my way down the stairs and out the front door.

*Looks at calendar* Oops.
Had a busy month with work stuff and book stuff. HOWEVER, I did get to play The Frozen Wilds and it's fucking amazing and I loved it! I wrote up a spoiler-ridden review on tumblr if anyone wants to read it. Otherwise, hope you enjoyed this chapter and I look forward to getting the next one up soon. For those of you who left messages earlier I will reply as soon as I can. :)