Out of Cryo | A Horizon: Zero Dawn Fanfiction

Chapter 3: Another Chance

           It wasn't long before Aloy and the guy - I didn't know his name – returned. Both looked a bit out of breath and sweaty but otherwise seemed fine. I don't remember how long it had been since they left and I was too overcome with grief to care.

"It won't be long before more show up to find their friends," Aloy stated as the two approached the campfire near where I sat.

The man smirked. "Ah, let them come. Killing those spineless idiots is nothing compared to what we've faced before!"

I saw the redhead shake her head in dismay, even as a small smile creeped onto her face. She seemed nice, hell, we probably would have been fast friends if we had met back home...no, in my time. The fact that it had been centuries since I had gone into cryo sleep with my family was mind-boggling and still very, very difficult to accept. I didn't want to accept it. The entire point of that was so that I could be with my family, people I knew.

Should have just done what Jenna and her family did. Would have been easier.

It was a dark thought and unfair to my parents, who gave everything so that I might have a chance to survive. Now, here I was, still alive and not really grateful at all.

Lost in my own thoughts and guilt, I didn't hear Aloy asking me a question. I shook my head and looked up, meeting her gaze.

"What?" I blurted.

"Are you hungry? You haven't eaten in...well, a long time." Her tone was not unfriendly, but she seemed standoffish in general.

Any other day I would have been politer, maybe even accepted her offer. But I didn't want to accept anything that happened. This wasn't my home – it would never be my home. My home was with my parents and brother, and now they were gone.

I climbed to my feet and despite my weakness, managed to break into a run in the opposite direction of a speechless Aloy and her friend. I may have been weak from the cryo, but I had been an athlete in school, which helped propel me through the woods as I sped past the trees as fast as my legs could carry me. My vision grew blurry from the tears that sprang to my eyes and I wiped them away quickly all while trying to focus on my breathing.

I ran for some time until the cluster of trees suddenly ended and I found myself skidding through the dirt to avoid falling off the sheer edge of the cliff it turned out I was on. I fell to my knees, panting, scraped and covered in dust, sweat, and dirt. I looked up.

What the fuck...

Beyond the cliff was a vast landscape of clean, clear streams around which tall grasses of all different kinds sprawled out for miles. The sun lit up the field resulting in a breathtakingly vibrant reflection of color that I could not remember ever seeing. A flock of geese honked out of sync with each other as they flew past my field of vision. Rabbits and a few other small animals scampered through the grasses. But it wasn't just the flora and fauna that caught my eye.

Machines. They were everywhere, different kinds of them, all remotely different from any kind of robot I had ever seen before. These weren't the cold, devouring Faro robots - far from it. In fact, they looked almost like-

Animals. Horses, rams, lions, even some kind of dinosaur-looking ones – a raptor I think – all dwarfed by a massive, brontosaurus-like machine with a metal saucer for a head that calmly walked among the others. Most were munching on the grass while others simply walked around, not appearing to pose any immediate threat. Their designs were...it was difficult to describe. Advanced. Inspired. These did not look like the war machines I had seen on TV as they destroyed the world.