Horizon: Project Eden

{A/N: Check out my patreon at patreon.com/TheFudgeNPC for any bonus chapters I've written or to support my work.}

1st Pov

Rapidly performing scans, I quickly ascertain the woman's condition, reviewing the collected data I can safely conclude the woman would have easily died if I didn't outfit the wyvern with an emergency medical.

Plotting a healing plan for the woman I start up the machine, instantly the medical device begins emitting specialised waves that promote stem cell reproduction. Leaving the woman to heal I connect to the wyvern and begin puppeteering it.

Turning I look down at the angry Oseram arguing with Aloy, reviewing their conversation I decide to cut in. Controlling the wyvern, I extend its front limb between the two humans, looking between them the Oseram man shakingly steps back before his face hardens and he reaches for his hammer.

"Stop, I'm working on healing your sister so be patient." – Edith

Looking down all the surrounding humans other than Aloy freeze up, sighing Aloy steps around the wyvern wing while rubbing her forehead. Moving over to the Oseram she gently turns him around before shooting me a mean look over her shoulder, smirking I decide to let her handle it.

"Erend calm down your sister isn't in any danger, Dervahl hurt her really badly and I asked Edith for a way to heal her. You have to trust me I don't want to hurt your sister and this is the only way to save her." – Aloy

Nodding Erend looks nervously between me still watching them through the wyvern and Aloy. Releasing a sigh, he seems to give up resistance and turns his attention completely to Aloy before whispering.

"I believe you Aloy, but why can that machine speak and who is Edith?" – Erend

Opening her mouth Aloy goes to answer his question but I cut her off, bending down with the wyverns neck I rest its head right behind them.

"I can hear you and I have a name, it's Edith not 'Machine'. I'm currently remotely piloting this machine from somewhere else." – Edith

Jumping Aloy's new friend pivots quickly with his hammer in hand, stopping millimetres from the wyvern he regains his composure and turns to Aloy. Sighing again Aloy looks like she wants to explain and I let her, leaving the two to talk I begin looking around with the wyvern.

As I look around I continue to monitor and heal the woman within the wyvern, stabilising her I begin working on repairing the damage the intense sound waves caused throughout her body. Outside I meticulously study the armour worn by the other humans in the area, appreciating the unique aesthetic look.

Happy with my small observation of their outfits I instead begin forming scans of their body, fidgeting nervously the humans keep their composure pretty well as red lasers illuminate their bodies. Overall, the people have very good health with a few minor scars, the worst of them has cancer though and I decide to help him out.

Pointing at the man with cancer I single him out as I configure the wyverns basic onboard fabricator to make a bottle of cancer medicine, surprisingly once the Old Ones were able to scan the DNA of any creature they very easily developed a cure to most afflictions.

"You there two to the right, come here." – Edith

Gulping nervously the targeted guard looks around nervously before hesitantly stepping forward, stepping forward he stops two metres from the wyvern and fiddles nervously. Reaching up the wyvern's limb a panel opens over the shoulder and I take out a small biodegradable bottle which I hand to him.

Reaching out the man is shivering in fright as I gently drop the bottle in his palm, looking at it the man sports a confused face. Chuckling I get to the explanation.

"You have a type of disease that will eventually kill you, inside that bottle you'll find pills to treat it. I want you to swallow one of those pills a day until the bottle is empty." – Edith

Nodding the man runs back over to his friends with the bottle in hand, feeling a tap on the wyverns leg I look down to see Aloy with Erend a few metres away. Lowering the wyverns head closer to her level I let her speak first.

"I gave Erend a basic lesson on what you are, I hope you don't mind. Anyway, how long will it take to heal Ersa." – Aloy

Checking the med bay, I find the woman is healed to a stable state from which she can recover with a few weeks rest, opening the wyvern's med bay I respond to Aloy.

"I've stabilised Ersa and healed her more critical injuries, now she just needs a few weeks to fully recover." – Edith

Rushing forward with tears pooling in his eyes Erend seems to lose all fear as he moves to his sister's side, blearily waking up Ersa barely gets a second to look around before the large Oseram man rushes her.

Groaning slightly when Erend pulls her into a tight hug she reciprocates it as she begins to look around over his shoulder, not finding this interesting any more I stop focusing on the reunited siblings and return my focus back to my main body at the Gaia prime facility.

Walking around the facility I go over the progress from my bots whilst using a background processor to track the conversation of Aloy's friends. Reaching the end of the workshop I open the door looking out over the crater and pull up one of my files containing a full map of the facility.

Overlaying the map with the crater I find the command centre and activate my thrusters, as I hover over the crater part of Aloy's conversation gets my interest and I put more focus on the conversation as I slow my flight.

Back at the rundown camp Erend has helped Ersa out of the wyvern and approached Aloy, moving my focus into the wyvern I'm just in time for Ersa to address me.

"Great metal beast I would like to thank you for your aid, and if it's not too much hassle I would like to formally invite you to a meeting with Sun-King Avad. I believe it would benefit all parties to establish a functioning relationship." – Ersa

Thinking over her suggestion I weigh the pros and cons before coming to a decision, lowering my head to just above their height I look Ersa straight in the eyes and address her.

"I agree, meeting the ruler of the humans in this region would be beneficial for my plans, unfortunately my main body is currently occupied so I'll have to send a back up body. This one won't do so I'll create a smaller and less intimidating body to converse with your king.

Head back now I'll contact Aloy when I'm ready." – Edith

Nodding Ersa jabs Erend in the side to indicate he needs to help her walk away, having a bit of small conversation with Aloy I decide to get back to my work and disconnect from the wyvern fully. Back at the Gaia prime facility I'm left facing a sealed door.

Reaching out I open the door into the facilities control centre, instantly air rushes into the room from around me. Stepping through I feel a pang of sadness as I look around at the bodies of the Alphas responsible for the Zero Dawn project, adding burying their bodies to my list I decide to find out what happened.

Stepping forward I access the main console and play the last recorded transmission; instantly holographic projections appear around the room showing the Alphas along with the floating form of Ted Faro in the centre of the room.

Growling I un-pause the video and decide to let it play out, around the room the holograms begin to move and talk about stuff. Tensions visibly begin to rise in the room as they start yelling about their Alpha clearance being overwritten by Omega clearance.

Standing above them Ted begins going on about how knowledge is a disease and how he doesn't want to give it to the next generation, then after snapping at the Alphas about trying to access the system he reveals he purged every copy of the Apollo database.

Growling in fury I can only watch the ancient recording from a time I wondered the world, wishing deeply I could have been there. Suddenly a synthetic voice echoes from the hologram that brings me back to the present.

Instantly the air is sucked out of the room leaving the people responsible for the continuation of life on earth to suffocate to death, meanwhile the man solely responsible for the destruction of all life and the eradication of thousands of years of knowledge watches with an arrogant aura around him.

Growling I smash my hand down through the console causing it to spark and fizzle out, pacing around the room it finally makes sense to me why mother gave me a full copy of Gaia's subordinate functions.

She must have discovered Ted added Omega level clearance to Gaia without her knowing and realised it was too late to remove it, then with her already low trust in Ted she would have sought a backup plan. So, she gave me a copy of all Gaia's functions not because she believed Gaia would fail but because she thought Ted would fuck it up.

Giving me Omega clearance was likely only possible because I didn't have a genetic code that needed to be registered into the system and all she had to do was give me a complete copy of the Omega clearance.

Them true to his character Ted royally fucked everything up and sent humanity as a whole back to the stone age, thinking it over my fury continues to grow as I consider all the long term problems in Gaia's systems. Each and every problem in some way traces back to her missing the Apollo database.

From the low biodiversity to the uneducated masses, Gaia must have been helpless to change it. Afterall she was ignorant and only had the knowledge she gathered during her initial learning phase.

Suppressing my rage, I begin to instead plot the most horrendous ways to torture Ted imaginable, I'll even build a time machine if I have to just to go back and get him so I can torture him.

Venting the excess heat generated during my rage I slowly begin walking around the room, passing by the corpses I slowly lap the large circular table till I reach the far side of the room. Reaching down I gently pick up a small glowing metallic device on the floor and slot it into a panel on my arm.

Accessing the master override code within the device I begin to make a copy of it before popping the device out of my arm. Picking up the first corpse I leave the room and activate my thrusters, flying gently I carry the mostly decayed corpse over to the other side of the crater and through the workshop.

Passing by Sylens he looks up briefly only to double take when he sees the corpse in my arms, silently raising he finger he seems to be about to ask a question but I cut him off by sending the recording to him and Aloy. While I'm at it I also toss the master override to him.

Outside the remains of the facility, I quickly and gently move to a area I planned out, far enough away from where the facility will be rebuilt, by the edge of a cliff bee bots work rapidly to create a memorial to my liking.

Approaching I gently place the first corpse into a completed coffin and close it, moving back into the facility I pass Sylens who is trembling in rage while watching the recording. Mildly surprised as it's the first time I saw Sylens show so much emotion I shrug it off and continue.

Over the next fifteen minutes I carefully move every corpse and place them in a coffin with their names on it. Feeling sentimental I also make a extra coffin and engrave 'The Old Ones' on it to represent all those who died due to Ted's stupid as shit mistakes and choices.

Stepping out of the facility Sylens silently watches as I lower the coffins beneath the ground and seal up the memorial, finished here I silently walk back into the facility. Passing Sylens he looks like he wants to ask something but remains quiet, stepping inside I begin manually controlling all my bots to improve their efficiency.

Receiving a call from Aloy I quickly accept it, appearing before me as a hologram she silently looks at me for a few seconds. Looking back at her I see a complex mess of emotions splayed across her face.

"Why did you send me that recording?" – Aloy

Looking confused, infuriated, and lost Aloy finally starts talking. Tapping my jaw with a extended claw I wait a few seconds before replying.

"I believe you should know what happened to those responsible for saving all life on earth, it's all humans right to know their saviours but Ted stripped that from them." – Edith

Looking tired Aloy looks off camera before sighing and addressing me again.

"Thank you Edith, I appreciate the truth. Unfortunately, I have to go for now, I need to catch a terrorist trying to blow up the city." – Aloy

Waving her off I end the call and get back to my work, as I work I also begin to plan an attack on Hades. Using the tallnecks under my control I'm able to access the built in cameras on my mechanical birds I've been using to regain control of key parts of the terraforming system and form a surveillance network.

Below one bird though I find something quite interesting, far from where I currently am in the middle of a forest my bird was able to spot some cultists working on a Tall Neck. Scanning the local signals, I confirm this Tall Neck is a key part of their focus network.

Knowing this I begin to formulate a plan and send it to Aloy, I'll assist her using the body I designed for communications. Till then though I'll wait, it won't be long now.

{A/N: Check out my patreon at patreon.com/TheFudgeNPC for any bonus chapters I've written or to support my work.}