Chapter 12 Something Worth Saving
Curie floated ahead, optics flashing in steady pulses as she scanned the shelves. Her voice, soft but precise, narrated every step.
"Medical rations… degraded beyond use. Suturing packs… viable with repairs. Field splints… incomplete."
Shelf after shelf, she cataloged the wreckage of another age. Trauma kits bloated by time. Dermal sealers turned brittle. Chemical packs crystalized into dust. Every time her tone grew hopeful, every time her claws hovered over a sealed case, it ended the same way:
"Negative integrity. Contaminated."
"Polymer breach. Data loss."
"Sterilization compromised."
Sula moved along the aisles, axe loose in her grip, silent. I followed with Terra's Gift low at my side, scanning as backup. But it was clear: the deeper into the vaults we went, the less the Old World had to offer.
Hope frayed.
Curie floated higher, closer to the ceiling racks. Her voice softened.
"Localized anomaly detected... energy signature minimal but structured."
She drifted toward a far wall where shelves became hardened bio-glass cases. Her claw tapped lightly against one of the panels. Dust clouded the label, but my Focus pinged it:
EMERGENCY MUSCLE REGENERATION FIELD UNIT.
Curie's optic flared brighter.
"Preliminary analysis—low-activity stasis confirmed. Structural seals intact."
She inserted a tool into the latch. The seal hissed, releasing a faint puff of inert gas. Inside, gleaming under the ancient dust, was a slim, armored injector the size of a thick forearm — sleek black with silver filament veins.
Neural and Muscular Regeneration Stimulator.
I stepped closer, my heart kicking against my ribs.
"This is it?" I asked.
Curie's voice warmed, almost like she was smiling behind the mechanical tones.
"Oui. Integrity seventy-two percent or higher. Functionality… probable. With minor recalibration, it should accelerate tissue reknitting, nerve resequencing, and muscle redeployment."
Carefully, I reached into the case and lifted the stimulator. It was heavier than it looked — dense with power cores and backup injectors. Curie floated closer, running a stabilizer beam over the unit to minimize shock damage.
"Please handle with care," she said. "The device's systems are optimized for rapid recovery. Maintaining integrity is critical."
She scanned it again, optic flashing.
"The design is highly efficient. Redundancy protocols are still active. This unit remains in excellent operational condition, given the elapsed... standby period."
I cradled the device against my chest, feeling its faint hum through my armor. Sula stepped closer, stopping just short of touching it.
"This will fix him?" she asked, voice tight.
Curie rotated toward her, tone calm and certain.
"Applied correctly, the patient's neuromuscular structures will regenerate. Ambulatory function will not only recover but strengthen. Without intervention, basic movement may continue, but reaction times and durability will be permanently impaired."
I shifted the stimulator into a field-carry position and nodded once.
"It'll get him back on his feet. And fighting."
Sula exhaled, her shoulders easing, the fire in her stance sharpening.
I glanced at the long climb ahead. Too risky to carry the device openly. Too precious to strap to my back and hope.
Without hesitation, I tapped the side of my wrist. The Nanoboy 3000 unlocked with a low pulse of blue light, mist curling outward. Carefully, I lowered the stimulator into the field.
The device shimmered, deconstructing into luminous threads pulled into the compression matrix at my wrist like silk vanishing into water.
Curie floated closer, optic pulsing sharply.
"Fascinating," she murmured. "That compression protocol... it is not in any standard archive. Neither civilian nor military."
I tapped the Nanoboy lightly.
"Prototype," I said simply. "Stolen before the end."
She tilted slightly in the air.
"I'm sorry. The end of what?"
I looked at her fully this time.
"You don't know," I murmured. "Of course you don't."
Sula frowned.
"She doesn't know what happened."
Curie floated higher, tone still professional.
"My records indicated I was scheduled for immediate activation during a regional disaster — likely a tornado. Before activation, I was placed into low-power standby… and never awakened."
Her voice didn't falter. But something in her cadence slowed.
"I assumed the building had been damaged in the storm. The disarray... the corrosion... I did not realize the situation was... long-term."
"Yeah," I said. "Longer than you think."
She hovered quietly.
"For how long?"
"Centuries," I said. "The world ended, Curie. The machines built to protect it turned into a swarm. The biosphere collapsed. No one made it out."
Curie's claws retracted slightly.
"I was built to preserve life," she said quietly. "To maintain inventory. Support field triage. I was never meant to sleep through extinction."
"No one was," I replied.
Sula stayed silent. She didn't mock Curie. She didn't pity her either. She just watched.
Curie's optic dimmed briefly, then steadied.
"Very well. I will adjust my protocols accordingly. I am... out of date. But my function remains."
"You're still needed," I said. "More than ever."
That settled her. She resumed scanning the corridor — precise, calm, composed — but now I could see it: the slight hesitation, the way her optic lingered on signs of decay she hadn't questioned before.
She was seeing it now.
Not damage.
History.
Curie resumed scanning the corridor, steady and efficient, but I saw it—that slight hesitation. The way her optic lingered too long on collapsed beams, on vines tangled through shattered ceiling vents.
She was adjusting.
Seeing.
Understanding.
I moved closer, keeping my voice low enough that only she and Sula would hear.
"You know," I said, "you might be the most complete medical database left on the planet."
Curie paused mid-scan. Her tri-claw arms retracted slightly, like a bird folding its wings.
"I..." she started, then stopped. Her voice was softer when she continued. "I was designed to support field triage. Catalog inventory. Execute pre-approved medical interventions within designated safety margins."
I shrugged.
"And now you're a little more than that."
Her optic rotated once—processing, recalibrating.
"In a world where many facilities are likely compromised," she said carefully, "the preservation of my knowledge could prove... statistically significant."
I gave a faint smile.
"That's one way to put it."
Sula looked between us, a faint smirk tugging at the edge of her mouth.
"Only a machine would call saving lives 'statistically significant,'" she muttered.
Curie hovered in place, visibly digesting the idea.
"You are suggesting," she said slowly, "that my operational parameters are now… unique."
"Yeah," I said. "You're not backup anymore. You're primary."
There was a long pause.
Then, with a gentle whir of her thrusters, Curie straightened.
"Then I shall adapt accordingly," she said simply. "Primary status accepted."
And somewhere between Curie's soft voice and the metallic creaks of the ruined hospital, it clicked.The Strikers.
They weren't just here to kill anything that moved.
They weren't scavengers.
They weren't hunters.
They were after knowledge.
Old knowledge.
Protected knowledge.
Knowledge like Curie.
That's why they stuck to the ruins. Why they moved awkwardly at first, half-formed like toddlers learning to walk. They weren't looking to overrun the Grove. They were trying to slip through — to find relics before anyone realized.
But most of the time, they failed.
The Kansani patrolled the ruins fiercely. They hunted anything that crawled too close to Ironwood Grove. Most Strikers got crushed before they ever left the city's bones.
Except this time.
The Boxer unit I'd fought upstairs — it had been different. Stronger. Faster. Smarter.
Not because it had been meant to escape.
Because it had gotten lucky.
Jorta's duel with the Centurion.
The chaos.
The blood.
Everyone's focus had shifted — Kansani and Legion alike. Eyes locked on a single brutal battle while something quieter slipped past.
The Boxer hadn't earned its freedom.
It had stumbled into it. If it had gotten past a Kansani warrior it would have known how to handle a bladed opponent. The Kansani paint doctrine wouldn't have worked
It wasn't the only proper unit because it was sent ahead. It was the only one because it was the one that got through.
And if even a handful of Striker units were learning — adapting — getting better at moving through the world without being noticed—
Then this wasn't about one Boxer.
It was about everything they were trying to take.
Curie included.
We moved quicker now, Curie floating between us, scanning methodically. I stayed close behind but caught Sula's eye and motioned her in. She crouched near a fallen ventilation shaft, tense.
"I figured it out," I said quietly.
She frowned.
"Figured what out?"
I jerked my chin back toward the deeper corridors.
"The machines we've been seeing down here—the half-finished ones, the twitchy ones. My Focus tagged them."
"Tagged them?" she echoed.
"Named them," I said. "Strikers. Anthropoid combat learners. They're not here for Ironwood Grove."
Sula's frown deepened.
"They're after Curie," I said flatly. "Or anything like her."
She blinked, sharp and fast.
"You're sure?"
I nodded grimly.
"Think about it. They stayed near the ruins. They stumbled around at first — scanning, learning. They weren't ready for open fights. They were looking for something tucked away. Something most tribes wouldn't even recognize."
I glanced at Curie, who floated patiently ahead.
"They want knowledge," I said. "Machines, data, Old World tech. Things like her."
Sula's hands tightened around the haft of her axe. Her voice dropped, low and grim."How have we not noticed this before?"
I shook my head. "No idea. Most probably get shredded by patrols before they ever make it this far. So your people wounldnt have noticed where they were heading. That Boxer? That was a mistake. It slipped through during the duel."
Sula absorbed that silently, her stance hardening by degrees.
"If they'd found her first," she said, voice like stone, "they would've taken her."
"Yeah," I said. "And would have been the worst thing possible."
She frowned but waited, giving me space to explain.
"Curie's not just a healer," I said, voice low. "She's a full database. Human anatomy. Neural mapping. Muscle construction. Everything about how the body is built and moves."
Sula glanced at Curie, then back at me, processing.
"If they had gotten her data," I continued, "they wouldn't just be copying how people move. They'd fix themselves. Right now, those Striker units — all twitchy and wrong — they're broken because they're guessing. Trying to imitate."
I shifted the weight of my gear, checking the hallway ahead before speaking again.
"If they had real human blueprints, the next generation wouldn't stumble. They'd move the way that Boxer moved upstairs — clean, fast, controlled."
Sula's hands flexed slightly around her axe.
"And if they learn faster..." she said.
I nodded.
"If they learn faster, we won't get a second chance."
She exhaled sharply, her breath a thin hiss between her teeth.
"Then we can't let them have her," she said.
"Exactly," I said. "She's not just a machine anymore. She's the reason we still have an advantage."
Sula didn't argue. She shifted position, moving faster — the conversation finished in her mind.
But after a few steps, she spoke again.
"If she's so important," Sula said, her voice sharper now, "why hasn't Hell's Angel come for her?"
I hesitated.
The thought hadn't even crossed my mind — and that made my gut clench.
Hell's Angel — the massive machine terror of the ruins — hadn't moved against us. Hadn't tried to claim Curie. Hadn't even stirred when the Boxer slipped free.
Hell's Angel wasn't a scavenger. It wasn't a stray machine acting on broken protocols. As far as I know it was a completed unit, even had a personality if what Sula was saying was true. The fact it was still in Wichita meant it had purpose. Focus.
Maybe it wasn't chasing Curie because it was guarding something else.
Something bigger.
The thought hit me hard.
Apollo?
The name surfaced like a half-forgotten prayer.
A system built for Zero Dawn — designed to hold the sum total of human knowledge.
If any remnant of Apollo still existed, even corrupted, even broken...
It would explain everything.
The Strikers.
The secrecy.
The way Hell's Angel stayed anchored to the heart of the ruins, never straying far.
Then a thought hit like a hammer.
A server.
Not just any server — one heavy enough, shielded enough, durable enough to survive centuries of collapse. Wichita was before the Fall where plenty of companies designed and stored plans for aircraft, some military.
There had to be a server strong enough to house a fragment of GAIA.
The realization twisted my stomach.
If even a piece of GAIA's original mind was buried here — trapped, but planning — it would explain everything.
The Strikers.
The secrecy.
The way Hell's Angel anchored itself, never roaming too far.
It wasn't guarding ruins.
It was guarding potential.
Dangerous, ancient potential.
I didn't say any of that aloud.
Not yet.
Sula was still watching me, waiting for an answer.
"It's protecting something," I said simply. "Something worse."
She didn't ask what.
She didn't have to.
The tension in her shoulders said enough.
We moved deeper into the ruins, the shadows growing thicker — and the burden of what we carried heavier.
Sula moved a few steps ahead, her boots crunching softly over broken tile. Then she paused, looking back over her shoulder at Curie, who floated calmly, scanning the corridor with mechanical precision.
"We need to get her to the Grove," Sula said, voice steady. "Not just to heal Jorta... but to protect her."
I adjusted the grip on my satchel.
"You think the Grove can hold against the Strikers?"
Sula's mouth tightened slightly, thinking.
"It's strong," she said. "Better than most places left standing. We have walls. Trained scouts. Watchers posted all the way to the Ironwood rim. Even the Legion wouldn't be able to attack it. Not without significant losses."
I nodded slowly, trusting her judgment.
"Then that's where we go."
Sula gave a small grunt of agreement.
"Move fast," she said. "Before the Strikers send some more, although I doubt many would slip through, the gathering for Jorta's duel was an exception."
As we started moving again, Curie floated closer, her optic focusing on Sula with polite precision.
"May I inquire," she asked, "who is Jorta? I have heard the name on multiple occasions."
Sula glanced at her, then back to the broken path ahead.
"My uncle," she said simply. "Our tribe's champion. He was wounded during a duel."
Curie adjusted her trajectory slightly, hovering between us.
"Injury severity?" she asked. "Location? Duration since trauma?"
Sula blinked, clearly not used to being grilled by a floating machine.
But Curie wasn't aggressive — just focused. Clinical.
A field medic from another age.
"I need specifics," Curie continued, calm but firm. "If I am to serve as primary attending physician, I must devise a proper treatment plan—not simply apply random aid."
Sula hesitated a second — just a second — then squared her shoulders and answered.
"Thigh wound," she said. "Deep cut. Muscle torn. Blood loss was bad at first, but we stopped it. Tribe healers bound it, used ash salves and a stim injector. That was... two days ago."
Curie processed the information instantly.
"Mechanically stabilized but without accelerated regeneration," she said. "Good initial response. However, the window for optimal neuromuscular realignment is closing rapidly. Scar tissue formation will inhibit full recovery if not corrected soon."
Sula grunted, clearly catching only part of that.
She shot a glance at my arm — at the Nanoboy housing the stimulator.
"Is that device enough?" she asked, voice lower now. There was a thin thread of worry there, buried under her usual steel. "Or do we need to find something else?"
Curie floated a little closer, her optic adjusting with a slow blink.
"Based on the preliminary data provided," she said precisely, "the neural and muscular regeneration stimulator should be the ideal intervention. It offers the highest probability of full recovery within the current healing window. However—"
She paused, letting the word hang.
"—no definitive treatment plan can be finalized until I directly examine the wound. Variables such as tissue degradation, infection vectors, and alignment disruption must be assessed in person."
Sula blinked again, slower this time, her mouth tightening.
"Most of that meant nothing to me," she muttered.
Curie, to her credit, floated a little closer, her voice patient.
"In simpler terms," she said, "I must look at the wound myself. Only then can I confirm if the stimulator will be enough... or if further steps are required."
Sula exhaled sharply, her hands tightening on her axe.
"Fine," she said. "But when you talk, use words a fighter can understand."
Curie's optic pulsed once — almost a blink — and she gave a small, courteous bow in midair.
"Understood."
I couldn't help the faint smirk tugging at my mouth as we pushed forward again.
Sula was doing what she always did.
Cutting through the noise.
Focusing on what mattered.
We moved steadily, urgency coiled tight under every step.
No words.
Only the creak of broken tile underfoot, the soft hum of Curie's thrusters, the heavy breath of a building too long abandoned.
The corridors twisted tighter as we pushed forward, walls cracked and sagging, the air thick with the stench of rust and old medicine.
Curie floated low, scanning ahead with quiet precision.
"Exit proximity detected," she whispered. "Caution: structural instability increasing."
Sula shifted her grip on her axe but kept her pace calm, measured.
The ruins pressed down around us — broken gurneys, shattered machines, half-sunken doorways leading into collapsed rooms. Every shadow felt like it might move.
But so far, nothing did.
No Strikers.
No ambushes.
No fresh threats.
And that… bothered me.
I kept my voice low, just enough for Sula to hear.
"I thought we'd have run into more Strikers by now," I muttered.
Sula didn't even glance at me. Her eyes stayed locked on the corridor ahead.
"We would have," she said. "If the Legion was still close."
She shifted slightly, checking an exposed side hall before continuing.
"My people would've moved back into position the moment the duel ended. Re-secured the patrol lines. Reclaimed Wichita. The Legion pulling out gave them the space."
She said it like it was obvious. Like breathing.
I exhaled slowly through my nose.
Of course.
The Kansani didn't leave openings for long.
Not if they could help it.
And the Strikers — whatever scraps of them were left lurking — were smart enough to avoid a full-strength patrol.
But the truth was even worse.
The Boxer hadn't just gotten lucky.
It had already made it through the Kansani lines uncontested — slipped right through the cracks during the duel chaos.
If Sula and I hadn't been here —
if we hadn't intercepted it in time —
there wouldn't have been anyone left to stop it.
Curie's data would have been taken.
And every new Striker after that wouldn't have been broken and clumsy.
They would have been clean. Efficient. Deadly from the start with an accurate understanding of human anatomy.
We didn't just stop a threat today. We stopped an evolution. We got lucky, we wouldn't get that lucky again.
The ruined hallways widened as we neared the outer edges of Newton Medical.
Curie floated close between us, optics dimmed to reduce visibility.
The smell of dust and cracked stone gave way to open air — dry, heavy with the scent of distant prairie grass.
Sunlight speared through a buckled exit door ahead, carving lines of gold across the broken floor.
We slipped outside in tight formation, keeping Curie shielded between us.
Beyond the hospital, the land opened up — fractured pavement giving way to shattered concrete lots and the skeletal remains of old service vehicles, long stripped bare by scavengers and time.
The horizon stretched wide and empty, crowned by the pale, washed-out blue of a late afternoon sky.
We kept moving, staying low, using whatever cover we could find.
After a few minutes, I glanced at Sula.
"Anything else I should be worried about out here?" I asked quietly. "Besides Legion scouts and a random Deathclaw?" GAIA's normal machines wouldn't be a problem as long as we stay clear.
Sula frowned. "Greenskins," she said. "Hunting bands are more active this time of year."
I gave her a blank look.
"Greenskins?"
Her eyes cut toward me like I'd asked what a spear was.
"You haven't seen them?" she asked.
"Maybe. Not sure what counts." I kept my voice even. "I've seen a lot of things out here I don't have names for."
Sula grunted.
"Big. Muscled. Green skin. Walk like men. Eat like wolves. Some use clubs. Some just use their hands."
I stayed quiet a second, then nodded slowly. Super mutants
"Sounds like something I'd remember."
"They're worse in winter when food runs low. Spring's better for hunting, so they range farther. Small groups. Fast-moving. If they haven't eaten in a day or two, they'll go after anything."
I nodded again — not too fast.
"How many in a group?"
"Five or six. Sometimes more. They don't always attack. But they're watching."
Sula's grip tightened subtly on her axe.
"Best not to get seen."
"Got it," I said.
I scanned the skyline again — fractured and still. But now it felt less empty.
Sula moved a little ahead, keeping her eyes on the terrain as we angled around a rusted-out transport frame half-swallowed by prairie weeds.
"They didn't used to be this bad," she said after a pause.
I looked toward her.
"The Greenskins?"
She nodded.
"Outside of winter, they kept to themselves. Stayed in the deeper ruins. Fought among their own."
"And now?" I asked.
Sula's mouth thinned.
"The Legion changed that. Raided their nesting grounds, burned their hunting camps, dragged the survivors out in chains."
Her voice didn't waver, but I could hear the edge in it — not pity, not sympathy, just the cold weight of fact.
"They learned to hate anything on two legs after that."
It tracked. Push any species hard enough — long enough — and it stops avoiding you and starts hunting back.
I didn't answer. Just nodded once.
Then Sula added something unexpected.
"There's one group that figured it out, though."
I glanced at her.
"Figured what out?"
"That they could trade," she said. "Machine scrap, animal skins — sometimes even water barrels."
"Trade with who?" I asked.
"Us," she said. "The Kansani."
I raised an eyebrow.
Sula shrugged slightly.
"They don't show up often. And never more than one at a time — lone trader. That's the rule. Show up in a group, we assume it's a raid and they die."
"And they follow that rule?" I asked.
"The smart ones do," she said. "Mostly just one. Big. Wears a spine-blade on his back like a trophy. Doesn't speak much. Just trades. Takes what we give, leaves what he's brought."
I gave her a sideways look.
"What do you call him?"
Sula adjusted her grip on her axe as we moved around a rust-choked light pole.
"They don't show up often. And never more than one at a time — lone trader. That's the rule. Show up in a group, we assume it's a raid and they die."
"And they follow that rule?" I asked.
"The smart ones do," she said. "Usually the same one comes back. Big bastard with a spine blade on his back. Doesn't speak much, but he understands a nod and a ration pouch."
I nodded slowly, then glanced sideways at her.
"What do you call him?"
Sula didn't look back. Her voice stayed even.
"Carrion."
I blinked.
"Because he picks over bodies?"
"Because he knows when not to bite the hand that feeds him," Sula said. "And because even if you leave him alone… he's still not your friend."
She paused, then added — almost like an afterthought.
"He doesn't like the name. Says one day he'll earn one of his own. One he gets to choose."
That made me pause. Not many super mutants thought like that. Most didn't care what you called them. Most couldn't even remember their own names, let alone want a new one.
But this one did.
I didn't press.
Just logged the detail away.
Because anything smart enough to want a name…might be smart enough to matter later.
We walked in silence for another stretch — the ruins slowly giving way to open land, patches of cracked stone fading into scrub and flattened grass.
Then I felt Sula's eyes on me.
She slowed, falling into step just behind my left shoulder. I glanced back.
She was staring at my temple.
More specifically — at the Focus.
"What?" I asked, keeping my tone neutral.
Sula didn't answer right away.
She stepped in closer — not hostile, just inspecting.
"That thing in your head," she said.
"My Focus?"
"Yeah." She squinted. "That blue shard with the lights. The way it glows when you look around. I've seen something like that before."
That got my attention.
"Where?"
She hesitated.
"On Carrion."
I stopped walking.
"You're sure?"
She nodded, slow but certain.
"I didn't think much of it back then. Looked like salvage. Just something stuck on his head. But now that I'm looking at yours… same glow. Same shape."
I kept my face still. My eyebrow raised in curiosity "Does he use it?"
Sula shrugged.
"Not in front of us. But to be fair you're the only other person I've seen use it. But I've seen him stare into ruins and stop walking, like he was listening to something we couldn't hear. Watching air that wasn't there."
She stepped ahead again, eyes forward.
We moved in silence for another few paces before she broke it.
"So," she said, voice low but firm, "what does it do?"
I glanced sideways at her. "The Focus?"
She nodded.
I slowed my steps just enough to match her pace. "It reads data. Old world stuff. Translates it, shows maps, marks threats. Sometimes... it picks up things no one else can see. Hidden doors. Power signatures. Machine signals. That kind of thing."
Sula narrowed her eyes slightly. "You mean it talks to the ruins."
"More or less," I said. "It sees what's left behind. Makes sense of it."
She was quiet for a moment, chewing on the thought like it had weight.
"And Carrion has one of those?"
"Maybe," I said carefully. "If it's the same kind. Hard to tell without seeing it up close."
She didn't say anything else right away. Just kept walking, jaw set.
I could tell her mind was already moving ahead—adding up what that meant. A Greenskin who could read the ruins. A trader who knew more than he let on. One who wanted a name.
The plains opened wider around us as we moved, every shadow and crumbling shape now holding just a bit more meaning than before.
I watched her carefully, keeping my tone neutral.
"If that thing on Carrion's head really is a Focus..." I said slowly, "could be why he's different. Smarter."
She didn't look over, but her pace shifted—just slightly.
"Maybe," she said. "Most of his kind don't think. They act. Fight. Eat. That's it. But Carrion? He waits. He trades. He watches people the way hunters watch prey—like he's studying, not starving."
I let that hang a moment, then asked casually, "How long have they been around?"
Sula glanced sideways, then back to the trail ahead.
"I was little when I first saw one," she said. "But the older hunters, the Wolf Masters—they say it started not long after the Derangement. When the machines changed. When Deathclaws started showing up."
She paused, voice even but edged with memory.
"First it was the machines turning hostile. Then came storms. Collapsed trails. People going missing in the deeper ruins. And then... the Greenskins. Not many at first. But enough."
I nodded like I was hearing it for the first time.
"So they've been around about fifteen years?"
"Give or take," she said. "They weren't like anything else. Big. Silent. No language. No reason. Just muscle and rage packed into something shaped like a man."
If Carrion had a Focus back then, and it had been active all this time... it might explain how he learned to trade, to track, to speak through silence. He didn't just stumble into survival—he'd been watching, adapting, calculating. Whatever he used to be, he wasn't just another brute anymore.
Sula kept walking beside me, quiet, her grip firm on the axe.
Neither of us said anything more for a while.
Sula adjusted her grip as we cleared a jagged step in the ruins. She glanced at me sideways, her expression still caught between skepticism and curiosity.
"Even if he has one... how would Carrion know how to use it?"
I exhaled through my nose, letting the thought form before answering.
"You said Greenskins only started showing up fifteen years ago, right?"
She nodded once.
"So if Carrion's that old—or younger—the Focus might've treated him like a child when he first picked it up."
That got her attention.
She frowned. "What do you mean?"
"Some tech from the Old World was smart enough to adjust based on who was using it," I said, keeping my voice level. "If a kid found a Focus, it wouldn't hit them with full schematics and machine codes. It'd start simple. Pictures. Words. Maybe even voice prompts. Like a teaching tool."
Sula narrowed her eyes. "You're saying it raised him?"
"I'm saying it might've given him just enough to understand what it was showing him. Symbols, warning signs, maybe even language if he stuck with it long enough."
She didn't respond immediately, but I could see her chewing on it.
"It's not impossible," I added. "Especially if he was alone. If he found it early, before anyone could rip it off or beat it out of him... maybe it became the only voice he trusted."
Sula grunted softly—still not fully convinced, but not dismissing it either.
Sula didn't say anything for a few steps. Then, with a sideways glance:
"I thought you said it doesn't talk to you?"
I shook my head.
"Not exactly. They don't hold conversations. They don't have personalities. But they can play messages. From old terminals, voice logs, training modules—whatever's still buried in the ruins."
She frowned. "So, it's just echoes."
"More like recordings," I said. "You find a bunker with a functioning data node, and if the Focus links to it, it'll show you whatever's left. Sometimes it's security footage. Sometimes it's voices. Names. Warnings. Even instructions."
I glanced out toward the horizon, where the last bones of the city gave way to grass.
"If Carrion had one of those on his head from the beginning… and he spent years walking through places no one else dared to go... He might've heard a lot of voices. Repeating words. Lessons. Orders."
"That's how he learned to speak," Sula said quietly.
"Could be," I nodded. "Not fluently. But enough to trade. Enough to understand."
She fell silent again, brow furrowed, processing.
It was a lot to accept. A Greenskin raised on ruins, taught by ghosts.
We walked for a while without speaking, the wind tugging gently at the grass creeping through the fractured pavement. The horizon was starting to shift—less ruin, more wild.
But something still nagged at me.
I glanced at Sula.
"Does Carrion have a group?"
She looked over, eyebrows raised. "What do you mean?"
"A tribe. A pack. Anyone else like him."
Sula was quiet for a moment. Then shook her head.
"No one's ever seen him with others. He always shows up alone. That's part of the rule—one trader, never more. Any more than that, and we assume it's a raid."
"And he never breaks it?"
"Not once," she said. "Sometimes he'll go a year without showing up. Then one day he's back. Same walk. Same pack. Like nothing changed."
I looked ahead again, my thoughts catching up to my words.
"Maybe it didn't."
Sula's expression shifted. "You think he's alone?"
I shrugged. "He might be. Or maybe whatever he came from didn't survive. Maybe he's the last one with enough sense not to charge screaming into a spear line."
Sula grunted. "If that's true… then he's smarter than most people I know."
I didn't argue.
Sula didn't respond right away. Her eyes stayed on the trail, her pace steady, but I could tell something shifted behind it.
She spoke a moment later—quieter this time.
"You know... now that you say it..."
I glanced over. She wasn't looking at me.
"There were times he didn't trade much. Brought scraps we didn't really need. Took less than he usually did. Just stood there. Like he was... waiting for something."
"Waiting for what?" I asked.
She shook her head. "Not sure. He never said a word unless it was part of a trade. Just nodded. Watched the fires. Watched the kids sparring. I thought he was being cautious. But now…"
She trailed off for a beat, then continued.
"Now I wonder if he just didn't want to leave."
I didn't say anything.
Because I'd seen that kind of quiet before. In soldiers without a squad. In animals that had lost their pack. In people too proud to admit they needed company.
Sula's voice stayed low.
"He never smiled. Don't even know if he can. But one time, one of the kids came up to him—Korra , the youngest in my home village. She didn't know any better. Just saw a tall man with a big blade on his back. She handed him a dried fruit. Like it was nothing."
I turned to look at her fully now.
"What did he do?"
Sula gave a small shrug. "Took it. Looked at it for a while. Then just... sat down. Stayed by the fire until she fell asleep. Didn't say a word. Next morning, he was gone."
The wind moved gently through the open field around us.
"Maybe he just wanted to feel like he belonged somewhere," I said.
Sula didn't answer.
I kept walking for a few more steps, then glanced over at her again.
"I'm not Kansani either," I said quietly. "Not really."
Sula stopped mid-step.
When I turned, she was looking at me—not with suspicion, but something sharper. Focused.
"You said," she began slowly, "that you were born in these lands. During the time of the Old Ones."
I felt my jaw tighten slightly. She wasn't wrong. I had said that—back when I first earned her trust. Back when I needed her to believe I was just another wanderer with strange tools and stranger scars.
"I did," I admitted.
She nodded once. "Then you're not Kansani. But you're not not Kansani either."
I raised an eyebrow. "That supposed to make sense?"
"It does to us," she said. "If the land remembers you, we don't forget you. Doesn't mean we make you chief. Doesn't mean we hand you our secrets. But it means we watch. And if you keep showing up…"
She looked ahead again, eyes scanning the open path.
"Then maybe one day, you stop being an outsider."
I didn't respond. Just walked beside her, letting the weight of her words settle where they needed to.
Because maybe she wasn't just talking about me.
Maybe she was talking about Carrion, too.
We walked in silence for a while after that, the distant wind tugging through broken weeds and half-buried stone. Then I asked the question I'd been circling since this whole talk began.
"What if Carrion helped us take down Hell's Angel?"
Sula glanced over sharply.
"Helped us?" she echoed.
"Yeah," I said. "Say he fought with you. Took real risk. Stood shoulder to shoulder with your warriors. Helped kill the thing that's haunted these ruins for years. What then?"
She didn't answer immediately.
Her gaze turned distant, jaw tight, fingers flexing once on the haft of her axe. When she spoke, her voice was slower—measured.
"Some would never accept it," she admitted. "They'd say it was a trick. A way to get close. Or that he's just another monster fighting a bigger one."
"But you?" I pressed.
Sula's brows furrowed. She didn't look at me.
"If he stood in front of that thing and fought for us—not for himself, not for trade—but for the Grove?" Her throat worked once before she answered.
"Then I'd fight beside him."
She looked at me then—steady, unflinching.
"I'd vouch for him. And my word carries weight," she added, almost like punctuation.
We kept walking, but something had shifted. The path felt different now—like it wasn't just leading away from Newton, but toward something.
I slowed my pace a little, thoughts tightening into something sharper.
If he really was alone out there, picking over wrecks and ruins... If he really had been walking these lands since the Derangement, learning in silence...
Then maybe he was just waiting for a reason.
Not a home.
A place to stand.
Quest Started: The Gentle Giant
Objective Updated:
[ ] Track Carrion's most recent path through the trading routes.
[ ] Initiate peaceful contact.
[ ] Convince Carrion to speak—not in barter, but in words.
"We'll need to find him," I said aloud.
Sula looked over.
"You mean now?"
"No," I shook my head. "But soon. After Jorta is healed. Before we attack Hell's Angel. Before anyone else makes that choice for us."
She gave a single nod, firm and final. "Then we start at the edge of the east prairie. That's where he trades most often. Might be signs left behind—ashes, footprints, something he thought no one would read."
Sula asked. "You really think he'll listen?"
I looked out across the wild expanse.
"I don't think he's waiting to be asked," I said. "I think he's just waiting for someone to believe he's worth asking. And maybe, for the first time in his life, hear someone say his name without spitting."
She didn't answer that either. But she didn't scoff.
That was enough.
We walked in silence again. Not the heavy kind. Not grief or fear.
Just thought.
Sula's grip had relaxed. My shoulders, too.
The air had cooled, the sun dropping toward the edge of the prairie.
The wind shifted. Long grass brushing our legs. Quiet again
And then—
"I believe you are both very kind," Curie said softly, her voice chiming just behind us.
Sula blinked and looked back. I glanced over my shoulder.
Curie was still floating between us, optics steady, arms tucked in neatly as she moved.
"I would offer you both a lollipop as a gesture of emotional encouragement," she continued, with clinical sincerity, "but I am afraid I am currently lacking the appropriate candy."
Sula's brow furrowed. "A... what?"
"Lollipop," I muttered. "It's candy. Sweet. On a stick. Old world thing. Usually handed out by healer to kids who didn't cry during injections."
Sula gave Curie a sideways look. "You give people sugar when they don't scream?"
"It was highly effective," Curie replied matter-of-factly. "Statistically linked to lowered stress responses in pediatric patients."
There was a pause. Then Sula gave the faintest huff of breath—something that might have been a laugh, or close enough.
"Well," she said, "next time you restock your sweet sticks, you owe me two."
Curie's optic pulsed once—content.
"Noted."
We kept walking.
The prairie stretched out ahead.
But it didn't feel so empty anymore.
.....
The hut stood alone at the edge of the treeline, built from twisted cedar trunks and salvaged ruinstone. A single curl of smoke rose from a carved vent at the top — faint, slow, like breath on a cold morning.
Inside, it was quiet.
Carrion sat hunched over a stump, the cracked surface blackened from years of use. Before him, an old pot steamed faintly — deer stew, thick with root vegetables and saltgrass. He stirred it with care, claws dulled from carving and cutting, not from battle.
Across from him, seated on a stone, was a mannequin — the kind used in department stores long since eaten by moss and time. Its paint had flaked away, its smile long gone, but Carrion had propped it upright. Gave it posture. Gave it a place.
They ate together, every night.
Or at least, he did.
Carrion ladled a scoop of stew into a dented tin bowl. Ate slowly. No sounds except the soft clink of bone spoon against metal.
Halfway through his meal, he paused.
Looked across the fire.
Then spoke — voice low, almost a whisper, the words gravel-ground from disuse.
"...Pass the salt?" he asked, begging for a response.
Silence.
Of course.
His shoulders rose in a breathless sigh. He didn't repeat himself. Didn't reach for the shaker tucked beside the mannequin's stiff hand.
He just looked at the figure a moment longer.
Then lowered his head.
A single tear traced the hard curve of his cheek — slow, deliberate — carving its own path through skin made for war.
He didn't wipe it away.
Didn't speak again.
The fire crackled quietly between them, and the prairie wind rattled gently against the walls.
And a small sad lonely whimper was heard.