Out of Cryo | A Horizon: Zero Dawn Fanfiction

Chapter 17: Shattered

"Becks? Got a minute?"

I nodded to my dad before quickly returning my attention to the Focus. "I gotta call you back, Jenna."

"But...fine. Later, Becks." I could tell Jenna was pissed but given the worried look on Dad's face and the kinds of conversations we'd been having lately, I didn't want to make things worse than they already were for my family.

I hung up. "What's up, Dad?"

Dad looked guilty. "Sorry. Was that Jenna?"

"No, no it's fine," I rushed. I knew he already felt horrible for what had happened, what was happening. I didn't need to add to that because he interrupted a fucking phone call. "Yeah it was."

"How is she?"

I sighed. "As good as you can expect anyone to be about this, honestly. Her parents – they aren't talking to her much about it."

He nodded and walked into the room. "That's a shame. I can understand it, though. You know she's welcome here for as long as the transports still run, right?"

"I know, Dad." I knew he was trying to help in his own way. Ever since he had dropped the news about the glitch, well, things around the house had been pretty depressing. Dennis rarely left his room. Mom tried to hold it together but it wasn't easy. Dad was really the only one who could actually stomach talking about it.

We hadn't heard anything else about Enduring Victory. Most of the major news networks had gone off the air. Dad had ventilation units installed on the house once the air started going to shit – breathable but not really safe without a mask. It was almost surreal but I knew everything that was happening was real. The world was ending – it was really ending, and my future along with it.

At least the one I had planned. Dad had finally told us about the cryo chamber in the basement a few months earlier. It had been a secret project, one that he wouldn't talk about, until one morning he and Mom sat down with Dennis and I and told us. I still wasn't exactly sure how it would work – I mean, being frozen for years until Project Zero Dawn could be launched and destroy all the machines? It sounded crazy and I said as much when Dad told me.

"What's up?" I asked him. He sat down in my desk chair across from the bed where I was.

"Becks...you know if there was a way to stop the machines that it would have been done by now, right?" he said.

Huh? "Uh...yeah. I know, Dad. But that's why they're working on Zero Dawn, right?"

He nodded. "Right, right. But you know when we come out of cryosleep that...that things are going to be different, right?"

"I know, Dad." Where is he going with this? "I'm okay with that. I just want us to be safe."

Dad folded his hands in his lap. He smiled as he twirled his wedding band around his finger, a habit he always had when he needed to talk about something serious. "You're really something, you know that? I'm proud of you. Your mom is, too."

Is he going to cry? "Um...thanks, Dad. Are you okay?"

He cleared his throat. "Yeah, of course, sweetheart." He stood up. "Well, I'd better go see if I can get your brother to leave his room. Dinner will probably be ready soon – don't make your mom have to call for you, please."

"I won't, Dad."

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Soft stroking - a hand on my back. I opened my eyes. It took me a moment to register that I was in bed, was not wearing anything, and that there was someone else in bed with me.