Kotallo dove from the side of the dam, grabbing a full lungful of air before striking the water, his arms propelling him strongly towards the centre, his legs kicking hard. Aloy would be able to escape the stickblast. She would freeze it then break free. But not before he did what was needed.

Burrowers caught sight of him and howled in the water, curling and twisting their bodies, scampering towards him as fast as they could…but they were not fast enough. With the goggles on, Kotallo could see exactly where he needed to go, right between the legs of the Stormbird.

Kotallo reached the hatch and grabbed it with his artificial arm, his legs braced on either side. The Stormbird screeched, trying to free its legs, the machines becoming frantic and all converging on his position.

But they were too late.

He tore the hatch free and immediately acid burst from the overloaded pipes, pouring into the water of the dam. Kotallo pushed off the dam floor, feeling machines try to grab him then heard them scream as the acid struck their bodies. He knew how they felt. The acid was strong and dangerous. Kotallo lunged for the Stormbird leg, clambering up it and out of the water. The machine tried to kick and when that didn’t work it tried to stab him with its beak but it couldn’t reach him. Kotallo clambered onto its back, running along one wing when it finally tore free of the stickblast and began to pump its wings, sending him sprawling.

“Kotallo!”

A piercing arrow hit one of the acid sacs beneath the Stormbird’s wing and it erupted, immediately starting to coat the wing and it stopped flapping, sagging down uselessly.

“Run!”

He scrambled to his feet and sprinted its length, able to get far closer to the edge of the dam on the Stormbird’s tremendous wingspan. Aloy was at the edge of the dam, reaching out her arm, the water beneath him filling up with acid, the machines writhing in agony and the Stormbird was howling.

“Jump!”

The wing was no longer at the level of the edge of the dam. It was slumped into the water. Kotallo ran for as far as he could, leaping into the air, slamming against the wall, digging his metal fingers into the slick surface. He couldn’t get a grip with anything other than his artificial arm, his feet scraping uselessly against the wall. Aloy leaned out far over the edge, stretching out her hand towards him.

“Come on!”

Kotallo tried to lunge and grab her hand but she was too far from him.

“It’s no use!” He heard the sound of a machine screeching and saw a single Longleg running towards her, having escaped the death pit of acid and machine carcasses. “Aloy, run!”

“No!” She spun around and began to fire at the Longleg, its antenna buzzing as it summoned more machines. Glinthawks began to cry out from overhead and shoot down ice.

As long as Kotallo needed her help, she would stay.

“Aloy!” She looked at him desperately. “I told you…whatever is left of my life…is yours…”

He released his fingers from the wall and fell into the water. The acid immediately began to nip at his body. It wasn’t full strength at the edges of the dam but it was increasing in intensity. Kotallo tried to find another way out, determined not to die unless he had no other choice.

As he swam, he heard a strange chugging sound and the base of the dam began to shift and move until large, gaping holes appeared in it. The water of the dam drained into the holes, sucking him down once more, banging him into pipes, turned this way and that in eternal darkness until, just as his lungs were able to explode and he would breathe the acid into his body, he was ejected out of a pipe, flying through the air and into the lake. The water of the lake was a great deal cleaner than what he had been in and brought an immediate reprieve. Kotallo spun around and started to swim to shore, climbing out and panting, pulling the goggles off. If not for them, his eyes would be ruined with all the time he’d spent in the acid.

He sank onto his back and filled his lungs over and over again with glorious, sweet air. He only moved when a Tideripper came close and he scrambled to escape its sight, not sure he could take it on in his present state. Fortunately, because of the sudden influx of acid into the lake, the Tiderippers gathering at the sites of the dam ejection system were preoccupied with the filtering of the water.

Kotallo made sure to stay out of sight and tried to activate his FOCUS.

It wouldn’t work.

“Two FOCUSES in two days…” He muttered and looked around. “Aloy…where would she have gone?”

He seemed to have been dropped into the lake on the most northern ejection point so he headed south westerly back towards the dam. He didn’t need to go far. On the far side of an outcrop in the lake, he spied Aloy kneeling in the water, clutching hold of something, her red hair hanging like a veil over her face as she rocked on her knees.

“No…Kotallo…no…”

“Aloy?” He approached and she turned, dropping what she was holding.

“Who are you?”

He stared at her in astonishment, her green eyes red and gritty.

“I…it is Kotallo.”

“Kotallo?” She gasped. “You’re alive?”

“Yes.”

“Then…who…” She stumbled to her feet, slipping backwards away from the corpse she had been cradling. Kotallo sighed, recognising the attire of the delver.

“It is an Oseram who fell to his death when the lake swallowed him.” He was a horrific sight, his bloated body starting to disintegrate from the acid.

“Ugh…” Aloy retched. “I…I thought…”

Kotallo closed his eyes. “You thought it was me…”

She nodded. “My FOCUS isn’t working…”

“Nor mine.”

“And my vision is all blurry…”

“Did you fall into the acid?” Kotallo grasped her arms and she turned her face aside. “Aloy?”

“I activated the emergency purge…then dove in about where I thought you’d gone.”

“Are you mad?”

“Glinthawks were everywhere!”

Kotallo shook his head. “Come on.” He led her hastily around the corner of the lake’s edge to where a small culvert, once guarded by a Tideripper and partially blocked by land, meant the water at the back was clean. “You must wash the acid from your body as soon as possible.” He didn’t argue with or force her. He simply slid into the water and dove beneath, running his hands through his hair and scrubbing at his body. From the motion behind him, he knew Aloy was following his example. Kotallo’s fingers kept getting caught on his armour and he knew that the acid would hide in pockets that he couldn’t reach so he pulled off his hauberk and chest plate, dropping them on the side of the pool. His boots followed and his waist wrapping then, because he was sure he could still feel the itching of the acid, he pulled his tunic off and his loin cloth.

“What…are you doing?!”

“I won’t give the acid any place to remain.” He said, keeping his back to her. He didn’t want to embarrass her but Kotallo knew that in order to survive, they had to be practical. Once he was convinced he’d washed all the acid from his body he put his hands on the side of the pool and heaved himself up. “The Oseram’s campsite is nearby in a cave. I will try to find enough clothing for us to be decent while our clothes dry.”

He made sure to keep his back to her, knowing he could do little about his exposed backside but he doubted Aloy would be ogling him anyway. He reached the campsite and rummaged through the Oseram’s meagre belongings and found a few things he thought they could use. He wrapped a length of fabric around his waist and tied it at his hip. Thankfully his artificial arm was undamaged, probably because the part that connected it to his body had been reinforced with Apex metal and had protected it although the paint had rubbed off…

Kotallo started and looked at his other arm. He had been streaked with white Tenakth paint all over his body. While not enough to fully obscure his inking, which he wouldn’t have wanted anyway, it had been obvious that he was bearing the colours of Hekarro’s Marshals. But his arm was clear of the white.

He touched his face, wondering if it had happened all over his body then closed his eyes.

“She didn’t recognise me…because all the paint has been removed…”

Kotallo shook his head, sighing at the irony that he had indeed accomplished that which he set out to do. He prepped the campfire, able to get it going quickly. The wood the Oseram had gathered had remained dry during the downpour, safe in the cave. The rain had paused but Kotallo suspected it would start back up again soon.

He gathered what he could to offer to Aloy and walked towards the pool, keeping his eyes firmly on the ground. He heard her gasp and the splash of water.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“I am not looking,” he insisted, placing the clothing he’d salvaged near where he’d dropped his clothes, “I hope what I’ve gathered is enough. Do not linger once you are dry as I think it is going to rain. The fire is lit. Come and be warm.”

He scooped up his clothing, turned and retreated to the campsite. The Oseram had some food supplies which he cobbled together into a sort of stew. It wasn’t brilliant but then he never considered his cooking to be spectacular. He also had to watch the way he reclined as the wrap around his waist that went almost to his knees was hardly all encompassing. He stirred the contents of the small pot over the fire as Aloy approached.

He'd found a couple of pieces of fabric, neither of which seemed long enough but she’d been able to wrap one, one way and the other, the other way around her waist. They overlapped and made a basic tunic. Her torso was draped in a halter neck, tied at the small of her back and at her neck. It was certainly more revealing than anything she had worn at the base but Kotallo wasn’t hardly about to point that out. They were both feeling awkward enough as it was.

She draped her sodden but acid free clothing over the rocks at the back of the cave where Kotallo’s were drying and then attempted to sit in her two piece skirt.

“I feel like a Carja nobleman’s daughter, trying to recline…” She muttered softly, finally sitting on her hip with her knees together, her ankles crossed. “There…the most ‘ladylike’ I’ve ever been.”

“I doubt that.” Kotallo said quietly.

“What’s for dinner?”

“Stew,” he eyed the drip from the spoon, “it mightn’t be very tasty…but it’s edible.”

She nodded then they sat in silence. “Well…this is awkward.”

“Decidedly.” Kotallo looked up, Aloy’s face framed by wet hair, its colour so dark it looked like machine fluid. “I removed my FOCUS. It’s over there.”

“Oh,” she slid hers off and put it with his on a rock, “sometimes they can repair themselves.”

Kotallo wondered if she was hoping it wouldn’t, the only evidence of his kiss in each of their minds. He wouldn’t bring it up if she didn’t.

“I feel so stupid.”

Her words surprised him. “What for?”

“For thinking that poor dead Oseram was you,” Aloy shook her head then tilted it on the side, dragging her fingers through her hair, letting the fire start to dry the strands, “and then to not even recognise you when you said my name…”

“I can only imagine that I look quite different…and your eyes were stinging from the acid.” Kotallo stirred the stew. “How are they now?”

“Better, thank you.” Aloy glanced at him. “I guess you got what you wanted after all…” Kotallo’s eyes widened. Did she mean the kiss? “You don’t have any paint on your skin…just the inking of marks.”

Kotallo’s shoulders relaxed. “I suppose so…strange that I had just given up the notion when it happened anyway.” He shrugged. “I don’t even know what I look like.”

“It’s not bad.”

“Bad?”

“No, I mean it’s weird.”

“Weird…”

“I mean…it’ll just…it takes some getting used to.”

“Ah.” Kotallo nodded and stirred the stew far more than it needed.

Rain began to patter down softly, joining with the crackle of the fire to fill the air with gentle sound.

“I’m glad your inking isn’t gone.”

“Even if it had been damaged, Gaia scanned my body and made a record of the marks.”

“Is that why the door to the control room was locked?”

“You tried to enter?” Kotallo’s face flamed with colour then he had to laugh internally at himself for he was even less dressed now.

“Gaia asked me to come back later and then I was waylaid by Erend and Zo’s little domestic.” Aloy scratched her right shoulder blade then flicked her hair back. “Not that I’m looking but there’s a space without inking on your chest that gets my attention more than all the marks you have.”

Kotallo knew what she was speaking about, the skin devoid of marks over his left breast. “You are not the first to ask about it.” He remarked, thinking about Marshal Fashav and how he had noticed it also.

“Is it meant for something?”

Kotallo nodded. “I don’t remember much about my parents…they died over twenty years ago now…but one thing I’ve never forgotten is their love for each other. My father often went bare-chest in summer while digging up the earth and I remember that on the left side of his chest he wore my mother’s ink on his skin. And I know that she also wore his.”

“Permanent declaration of love…”

“Indeed.”

Aloy scratched her shoulder again. “The old ones used to give rings to each other.”

“Rings?”

“Little ones…that go on the finger.” She tapped her hand.

“Seems oddly…temporary. You can remove rings.”

“I suppose Tenakth are pretty absolute in their devotion to each other.” Aloy mused.

“I only speak from watching my parents…if their love is any indication, then yes.”

Aloy’s eyes were soft on his face. “I’m sorry they died not long before Hekarro took the Grove.”

“As am I,” Kotallo spooned some of the stew into a bowl for Aloy, taking the cup for himself, “although…now that I look back on my life…”

She took the stew and waited, gazing at him. “What?”

Kotallo breathed out and sighed. “I…there seems to have been purpose in all of my grief. From the loss of my parents, I was taken to the Bulwark and became part of Orphan Squad. My leader’s death saved countless Tenakth and his sister’s death gave me the determination to end the Carja threat. When I was injured during my time at Cinnabar Sands, I learned of the Utaru and their tribute agreement. My best friend’s death allowed me to throw open the gates of Barren Light, even surviving three arrows. My banishment from the Bulwark, though guised as an honour, led me to being a Marshal. As a Marshal, I was at Barren Light when I lost my arm and for a time, I was sure there was nothing left for me…I wished I had not survived.”

“But you did.”

“Yes,” he nodded and looked at her directly, “only to be saddled with an arrogant, possibly mad, outlander who thought she could bring down a mountain.”

“I was not arrogant!”

“I know that now,” Kotallo argued, “but at the time you were making ridiculous claims about being able to topple the Bulwark and charging into the fray against rebels and a Tremortusk…”

Aloy opened her mouth then paused, seeing her actions in a new light. “Well…I refute arrogant.”

“As do I.”

“Why?”

“Because you cared enough to worry about my people after the destruction of the Bulwark,” Kotallo gazed at her gently, “and though you had done more than Hekarro asked of you, you offered yourself to help in the fight against Regalla. Had you been arrogant, you would not have cared for those you hurt.”

Aloy’s expression was surprised and thoughtful. “I never thought about it like that. I guess…I must have been quite a handful.” She licked her lips after swallowing some stew. “Did you really think I was mad?”

Kotallo shrugged. “I thought it was a distinct possibility…but then you always managed to do that which you claimed. And after the Kulrut I could see no better path for my life than to pledge myself to your mission.” Kotallo poured some of the stew down his throat and swallowed it, licking his lips. “I hope, one day, to discover the hidden purpose behind the death of Varl.” He glanced at her, wondering what she thought of that.

“I’m not sure it has to do with divine purpose,” Aloy admitted, “perhaps it has more to do with taking what you’ve been given…or what’s been taken away…and putting it to use.”

“Perhaps,” Kotallo looked up at the stars, “although I would not mind divine purpose.” He swallowed down some more stew.

“This isn’t half bad…” Aloy offered.

“It isn’t half good either.”

“No.” She laughed softly and put it down. “But at least we won’t starve.” She scratched at her shoulder again but before Kotallo could ask what was wrong, she looked at him. “Kotallo, why haven’t you marked that place on your chest?”

His eyes widened. “Excuse me?”

“I mean,” she blundered hastily, “you were a warrior during the Red Raids, the hero who opened the gates of Barren Light, survivor of three Carja arrows…women must have been throwing themselves at you.”

Kotallo sighed. “There was one woman’s mark I would have gladly worn…”

“Okay…” Aloy shifted awkwardly.

“A Sky Clan woman,” he said quickly and Aloy nodded, “whom I was infatuated with during my youth. The niece of a former commander of the Sky Clan.” Kotallo picked up a piece of wood and stared at it. “I was nothing compared to her, an orphan…and a scrawny one at that. So, when she finally noticed me…I thought all my dreams had come true and for a while, I believed so in ignorance.”

“Ignorance?”

He cleared his throat and looked at Aloy. “I was madly in love…but she only sought to use me to bring contention with her female peers. There was no love in her heart for me. Only ambition…and I was not nearly ambitious enough to match her lust for power.”

“She sounds awful.” Aloy coughed. “I mean…not that I really know…”

“I defended her against my best friend and nearly lost him because of my foolishness…until I found out just how I had been used.”

They sat in silence for a moment.

“What was her name?” Aloy asked softly.

He tossed the wood into the fire, the sparks rising. “Olenka.”

“After the taking of Barren Light…I wonder if she didn’t regret treating you like that.”

“She said as much as she tried to seduce me.”

“Oh!”

“Which I turned down,” he insisted, “for while I was growing more uncomfortable around Tekotteh, I was not about to steal the woman from his bed.”

“She was his partner?” Kotallo nodded. Aloy pulled a face. “No wonder you didn’t want to go back to the Bulwark…”

“Thankfully I did not see her, although I was blinded by my self pity and anger at the time. And now she’s dead.”

“Dead?”

“The Scorcher we took down together while testing the arm,” he gestured to where it lay, having taken it off to dry, “killed more than a few of the Sky Clan, including Olenka and her squad.”

“I’m sorry…”

“Avenging Olenka was not the reason I chose it as my target,” Kotallo reassured Aloy, “I simply wanted to…bury the past.”

“Is that why you ripped its heart out?”

“Hearts are valuable.” Kotallo said lightly, wishing she hadn’t remembered that particular detail.

“They are indeed.” Aloy scratched again.

“What is wrong with your shoulder?” Kotallo asked sharply.

“I think I scraped it on the lake’s stony bed when I was ejected out of the pipe.”

Kotallo got up and moved around to her side of the campfire. “Let me see.” He squatted and peered at her shoulder, her skin raw and angry red. “It is a bad graze.”

“Stings…”

“Possibly from the acid.” Kotallo stood up and looked at the almost black landscape of a land in the grip of night which had fallen as they’d talked. Thunder rumbled overhead. The rain was not heavy but he suspected shortly it would be a heavy downpour. “One moment…” He headed into the dark and, using a lightning flash to guide him, found a spiny shrub with pointed tendrils in dull green. He tore a tendril off and returned to the campfire. “My people use this to treat acid burns, fire burns…insect bites…” He sat behind Aloy. “May I?”

“Alright…”

He swept her hair aside, over her bare shoulder and dabbed the torn edge of the plant against her skin. She jumped, air hissing through her teeth.

“Does it hurt?”

“Cold.”

“It will help, I promise.” He squeezed out as much of the slimy substance from the plant as he could then dropped it to one side, using his fingers to smear it across the graze. After the initial sharp intake, Aloy remained still and quiet. Kotallo kept gently stroking her skin. He told himself he was making sure the graze was completely covered. He also knew he was lying to himself.

It was agony for him to be so close.

Agony yet wonderfully forbidden.

Kotallo found himself marveling at the smoothness of her skin, the freckles across her shoulders, the rich colour of her hair, the way she seemed to smell of the wind and rain, of the Wings of the Ten and of warm…soft…

Before he knew it, he was leaning so close that his lips touched the nape of her neck. In half a heartbeat he hoped frantically that his little indiscretion would go unnoticed but she let out a small gasp and stiffened.

Kotallo closed his eyes and waited for her to berate him, and rightly so…

…yet she remained silent and still.

She had not turned around and slapped him or run to the other side of the campfire, slinging curses at him.

She remained where she was.

He kissed her uninjured shoulder, training along her skin, soft, tender kisses before going back to her neck, his breathing becoming heavy. His scars were stretching, the pain always present and yet Kotallo paid it no heed, utterly and completely enthralled and undone.

“Aloy…I…would wear your mark…” Kotallo whispered against her ear. “Yours and yours alone…”

He had always been an ineloquent man…but his words seemed to touch her heart. She turned and faced him, her green eyes shimmering with intensity before she closed the gap between them, her fingers sliding around his neck, his right arm holding her close…

…and yet their passion demanded that they be closer still.

As the rain poured down, lightning flashed and thunder rumbled, Aloy and Kotallo discovered each other and though there were a million things to say to each other, when it was over, they simply lay down in each other’s arms…and fell asleep.