#sylene writes

[eri-223]

situation: helping someone remove an accessory/article of clothing/armor/etc. not often removed? (i was thinking of necklaces, but...)

ah, friend, I asked for cute prompts, received many lovely ones including this one, and immediately started writing for you the aftermath of bloody violence. there are some cute parts in this, perhaps. I did not consult my fanfiction medical expert except to say like "I got this," so any mistakes are my own. for anyone who has been following my hfw opinions closely: burning shores exists in my headcanon only under certain conditions. this is one of those conditions. similarly, this story is not in signal-verse, although perhaps if I had written about one sentence longer it would have had to be, since these two need about thirty thousand words of buildup to get to the kissin. shoutout to the playstation cosplay guides, which provided turnarounds and useful information about materials and such.

aloy/sylens, 800 words, pre-ship 

*

Sylens slammed to his knees in the grass, green staining up his pant leg. The verdant jungle colors clashed with blood so red and free-flowing Aloy thought for a moment the machine might have taken off his hand.

Aloy and Sylens had gone to the jungle shore tracing rumors of a surviving Zenith mobile platform. Now, Aloy left her spear in the machine’s guts, seeing by the shudder and collapse that it wouldn’t rise up again, and hit her own knees hard. Craned to see whether she was about to have to figure out a prosthetic for the only person on the planet who could reverse engineer a Zenith shield.

Sylens winced and ripped a strip of cloth off his wrist. Repositioned it to staunch the blood pooling over the back of his hand. His metal brace hung at a broken angle; the machine’s flail had cut up and under the brace, through leather and linen. Aloy’s voice clenched in her throat. This can’t be what kills him. Not after everything. 

She wouldn’t fuss over him, and he wouldn’t want her to. But her throat relaxed when he spoke. “Need to elevate it —“

So he hung his head against the machine’s strange, smooth chassis and stretched his arms up, one hand clasping the other wrist. Closed his eyes and breathed hard. Aloy, breathing hard too and wanting to close her own eyes, started tearing the machine’s wrenched-apart limbs into scrap. Sylens wouldn’t necessarily tell her if he was hurt badly, but she’d be angry if he didn’t, angry that he valued his aloofness more than their shared venture, angry that … well, scared that he’d leave her again. They’d just gotten used to each other. They’d just started sharing meals with Beta at the base.

“Tell me that cut isn’t as bad as it looks,” Aloy finally said, half-way finished with material recovery. 

“It is not as bad as it looks.” Sylens struggled to unpeel tangled cloth from the metal brace as blood dried and turned tacky. 

“Let me help you.”

“The wound shouldn’t be moved now. Surely, you know that much.”

Aloy climbed on top of the machine. Flopped down on her belly and eased his palm off the metal from above. “It’s tangled.”

“I know.”

“Do you mind if I move this?” The brace — a strut from a Ravager, most likely — had nearly fallen loose from the wrappings. 

He sighed, exasperated, and she pulled back. Battlefield care was one thing. But the blood was clotting, the emergency ending, and she hoped to show some respect for him. She wouldn’t help if he didn’t want, out of both that respect and many years of anger. Grudging as it was, their last serious conversation — after her return from the Burning Shores — had left her with a smile and some mutual respect, and had left him working in her room, as comfortable there as he was in his own skin.  

“If you must,” he said.

She untangled the brace, pulling strips of blue linen with it, and tied it to her belt. After that he was quiet and watched her. The leather wrapping hooked around his thumb was ripped down to the big veins at his wrist.

“I have to cut this off,” she said, “Or it’ll stick in the wound.”

Sylens nodded. 

“This angle will make it difficult,” Aloy said, realizing as she spoke. “Put your hand down. The blood is clotting.”

He nodded. With both of them standing in the green clearing she could lay the golden edge of an arrowhead against his wrist and tear. The battlefield healing was nothing new to her — she’d helped other people with wounds after the battle of Meridian, and after some Tenakth or Utaru skirmishes — but since Sylens had always held himself so aloof, it was strange to see the calmness with which he presented the underside of his wrist to her weapon. Aloy found herself holding the back of his hand in the palm of hers to wash the wound. He kept his fingers curled up so as not to touch her. The flail had laid open a thin layer of fat on his lower arm, but at the back just below the first set of piercings, not near the vital veins. She had done all she needed to do now; he could do the rest. But … 

“I have herbs,” she said. “Let me fix this up before we start a long ride back.”

So she packed the wound too, and this let her feel the warm weight of his wrist in her palm for a while longer, let her look at the proportions of him and feel the pulse point under her fingertips. She hadn’t noticed such details before, the hair on his arm or the lines on his palm. All the while he looked at her with the new openness she had seen since he started living at the base, a sort of surprise that softened his face. People think Avad looks regal, Aloy thought, because they’ve never seen Sylens … 

His hand trembled slightly. Aloy had packed the wound all she could. She handed him the brace and the torn linen strips, which he took in a firm left hand. No tremble there at all. 

#writings #horizon forbidden west #aloy/sylens #hzd for ts #sylens #aloy

[banukaihelpme]

what do you think happened to the members of Owl's Watch after Sylens stole the stuff from Malmstrom? people vouched for him but then they disappeared too. were they a real werak? or did he hire some exiles and bandits?

#writing shenanigans #banuk #sylens #this and more coming to an a03 near you #...eventually.

[wykart]

Summary: Two Banuk children follow a trail of ancient light to a ruin underground. They follow it for different reasons, but with the same, heart-deep hunger. For one, solving this mystery might give him the answers that the Shamans of the Werak refuse to share. For the other, it's far simpler. It called to him, and he answered.

----

Brin and Sylens were childhood friends and then they went insane in opposite directions. :)

#taking a break from my huge horizon fanfic to write a new horizon fanfic sorryyyy #horizon #horizon zero dawn #horizon forbidden west #sylens #brin #fanfic #fanfiction #my writing

[owlswatch]

About 100 words of fic written today. Finally nailing down my Sylens backstory and trying to figure out how to fit it into a rather unfocused chapter:

“Who taught you?” Beta asked.

“I taught myself,” Sylens said.

“But what about the other things? Hunting, and — you had parents, didn’t you?”

Sobecks, always asking about parents. 

When he had learned about the blue light and the machine spirits he’d been quiet but close with his fellow aspirants, with an old, practical shaman named Ulatun. Most of them were quiet and somber, too. Most of them came from small weraks and demanding parents. He’d thought of Ulatun as the mother he could have had. 

As he got older she was never able to answer his questions, though, just spiraled around them like the snow in the wind. Her answers were clever but empty, and when it came Sylens’ turn to climb the mountain he had asked and asked and asked.

The snow swirled. He was better than Ulatun at giving answers. 

#horizon forbidden west #sylens #beta #writings

[forbiddenwestern]

Cool how Beta and Sylens are both great foils for Aloy but they’re also quite different from each other

#considering writing something about the three of them post-game but might not get around to it #aloy #beta #sylens #hfw

[sufferingsideships]

LET ME PUNCH SYLENS IN THE FACE DAMNIT

Just one time.

A one time rent fee for using the base after being an absolute shit face for 2 games

#it would satisfy something deep in my soul #don’t get me wrong his character overall and how they write/use him is fantastic #but you’re telling me Aloy wouldn’t DECK his ass at least once for all that shit? #not even post zenith battle????? #gtfo #LET HER PUNCH HIM #as a lil treat #she deserves it #so do we #just sayin #horizon forbidden west #forbidden west shit posting #horizon shit posting #spoilers? #horizon forbidden west spoilers #sylens #justice for Aloy let her punch him

[fuzzydefiance]

5 min 30 secs into episode 160.  What a great finale.  I am so happy my bois got their happy ever after :) *screams into a pillow*

#tma #i know i need to finish out the final season #but it's such a perfect little ending #right before the end of the world #ooh I just finished playing Horizon #and i wonder how the fears would deal with that extinction? #times i wish i could write #or draw well #tma horizon crossover #the avatars of the fears working with project zero dawn #elias as sylens #neither of those names look right #ugh spelling

[queenofthequillandink]

Anger was an interesting, almost foreign emotion to Sylens, after all this time spent raising himself above it. He'd sneered at Aloy's anger in the way she fights, half expecting her to get herself killed before she could fulfill her purpose for him. It wasn't until she rode to defend the Nora that he realized he'd never seen her truly angry.

This is a short, introspective piece set towards the end of Horizon Zero Dawn. Simply put, I love getting to see Aloy in a rage.

#horizon zero dawn #aloy #aloy horizon #sylens #sylens horizon #my writing #original #fic rec

[melodyssolarsystem]

I randomly got this idea while listening to that one scene from Bojack Horeman. So if the dialogue reminds you of anything, that’s what it is.

Angsty piece between Aloy, Sylens and.. Zo? Gee golly gosh I sure wonder what she’s doing here.. anyways enjoy!!

“I do not understand why you are making me do this.” He grumbles, yet he manages to keep that little smug expression that makes you want to punch the absolute shit out of him.

“Because, Sylens, she deserves an apology.” The Gravesinger replies, gesturing to the room Aloy claims as her own. She’s in there, but the door is closed.

“I have apologised to her.” Sylens turns his back to leave, but Zo isn’t having it. She grabs his wrist and yanks him back to where he was standing. She’s not sure if it’s hormones or genuine anger at this point.

“She’s told me about that.” Zo keeps a firm grip on the Banuk’s wrist, who is now facing her. His expression is altered for a moment. For a moment, he looks.. different. Scared, no. But definitely.. different. “And it was over a year ago. And somehow, you’ve managed to do other shit to hurt and betray her.” Zo’s grip tightens subconsciously, and it definitely begins to sting, at the very least. Sylens has a high pain tolerance. “So either you apologise to her, or you’ll be apologising to. My. Spear.” Zo narrows her eyes at him, and small wave of fear vibrates through Sylens’ mind, but he hides it well. It’s gone before he can even comprehend that for a split second he was scared of this woman. “..fine.” Sylens snaps his wrist away and out of Zo’s hand.

“Good.” Zo folds her arms, and it’s her turn to have the smug look. “Off you go then.” The Gravesinger waves her hand dismissively in the direction of Aloy’s room. Sylens mumbles a few curses while walking towards the door.

Inside the room, Aloy is standing in the middle. She’s not.. doing anything. Not looking at data, not talking to herself, just.. standing. Thinking. Comprehending the last few days.

GEMINI.

The door opens with a familiar swoosh. The Nora jumps, but she’s quick to bury away her fear. She does not turn around. “Aloy.” Zo greets, her smugness being heard ever so slightly. She shakes her head, this is serious. “Sylens has something he’d like to say.”

Sylens takes a breath and opens his mouth to speak, but Aloy interrupts.

“So, he’s apologising?”

The two are both slightly taken aback by Aloy’s snapping, but Sylens shakes his head. “Yes. I’m.. sorry. For everything.” The struggle is heard for a moment.

“Ok.” Aloy responds simply. “I don’t forgive you.”

“Aloy, he said he’s sorry.” Zo takes on her stern mother voice, yet it’s also half sympathetic.

“Yes. And I don’t. Forgive him.” The ginger replies, her anger beginning to tinge her voice.

“Stubborn as always, Aloy.” Sylens folds his arms.

“Aloy, I don’t think you understand what’s happening.” Zo walks forward, sympathy finally taking over her tone entirely. “We’re going to infiltrate the Zenith base soon, and this could be the last time you guys-“

“No.” The Nora snaps. Zo flinches, lowering the hand she was planning to place on Aloy’s shoulder. Sylens seems unphased, his expression unchanged and body completely still. “I’m not giving him closure. He doesn’t get that.” Her fists clenched. “He has to live with the shitty things he did for the rest of his miserable little life. He has to know that it’s never, ever going to be ok.” Aloy doesn’t turn around. She’s far too fucking angry to even look at them right now. “Now get out.”

“Finally.. as expected.” Sylens rolls his eyes, and walks out.

There’s silence between the two remaining women, before Aloy speaks up. “You too, Zo.”

“What?”

“I said get out.” Aloy finally turns around, narrowing angry eyes at Zo. “That apology wasn’t fucking genuine. You forced it. You forced it out of him because I know that first apology those years ago was fake, said only to gain my trust, and that bitch has never apologised to anyone.” She spat. “Now get. The hell. Out.” She turns back around and walks away further into her room. “Before I make you.”

Zo pauses for a moment. Her shoulders relax, but not because she’s relaxing. She nods, sadness filling her face. She turns to leave, but stops at the doorway. “I’m sorry.”

“I don’t need anymore fake apologies right now. Get out. And GAIA, lock the door behind her.” The Nora orders of both of them. Zo walks out, and the door swooshes closed, light red instead of its normal blue. GAIA normally responds to orders, but with the empathy she was programmed with.. suggested she shouldn’t.

Aloy stands in silence for a moment more, again. She growls quietly, fists tightening again. Before she can even comprehend what she’s doing, her spear is in her hand, and she’s swinging it at the practice dummy in her room with a shout of anger. She stands there, breathing for a moment, spear still stabbed into the dummy.

The Nora then collapses onto her knees with a sob.

#horizon forbidden west #horizon #hfw #aloy #zo #sylens #sylens is a mother fucking backstabber #angst #writing #inspired by #bojack horseman #sorry not sorry #fanfiction #oneshot

[artekai]

I think I might have to bump Fross's age up by a few years... 🤔

#ramble #oc tag #oc: fross #i hadn't considered that the whole immortality stuff would've taken a while to work out :/ #so even if the apocalypse hits when he is 18-19 he wouldn't stop aging at that time :/ #but also #if i have the apocalypse hit not right after his high school graduation but WHILE he is in college #that would mean he has some background in robotics which means i can have him directly involved in the creation of nemesis #(an idea i need to see) #maybe he can straight up be a robotics prodigy. building robots since he was old enough to write code. idk asdfghgs #that would make him a foil to lis... :') #moreover. it would give him something to talk to sylens about 👀

[kelsochronicles]

Potential Horizon 3 Map

I’m throwing this up as a reference. It’s just fun speculation and I know a lot can happen during development. Horizon is known for leaving little bread crumbs leading into the next game. So, in going off this, and a statement from writing director Ben McCaw, I believe these are mainline quest points for the next game…

Before you speak with Sylens at the end of BS, he’s looking over specific spots on a map of North America. I’ve done my best to surmise what those specific locations are.

Location 1: The northern most point in Canada I could not find any significant settlement names (Canadians help me out here if you know). It all looked like a huge wildlife park preserve. Potential Ban-Ur location?

Location 2: The spot below to the left is very close to Edmonton or Calgary. Maybe Banff? Most likely candidate for Ban-Ur.

Locations 3&4: The two close together is Salt Lake and I think Boise, Idaho. Or some other location in eastern Oregon. Salt Lake is the FAS facility mentioned in the data point collected from Londra (Dagger in my Boot). Most likely Boise is The Claim homeland of the Oseram, and potentially, Elysium. As Elysium was stated to only be “miles” from GAIA Prime.

Location 5: And at the very bottom we have Houston. Hard to pinpoint that because of how much the coastline has changed. However, that’s a very important NASA base so I’m very curious to see what that could entail.

Anyway! If we do get a map this size, WOW. I’m deeply excited at the prospect of finally visiting the homeland of the Oseram and Banuk. Banuk especially.

#horizon forbidden west pc #horizon forbidden west #horizon 3 theory #Banuk #Oseram #Aloy

[incorrectfandomsapphic]

Horizon: Forbidden West #068

Source: Tumblr write-it-motherfuckers

Tilda: There's something seriously wrong with you! Sylens: ..coming from you, that's actually a little worrying.

#horizon forbidden west #incorrect horizon #incorrect quotes #Tilda van der Meer #Sylens #Source Tumblr

[focusontheheart]

Find questions and answers here, tagged with #foth: FAQs. Other hype and general asks can be found under the tag #foth: asks and answers.

This FAQ post will be updated periodically.

---

Q: When is the release date for Focus On the Heart?

A: The projected release date is Spring 2024.

---

Q: How much will it cost?

A: Focus On the Heart will be free to play!

---

Q: What platforms will Focus on the Heart be available on?

A: It will be available to play on PC and Mac.

---

Q: How can I support Focus On the Heart?

A: Engagement! Like us on Twitter and Instagram, retweet our posts, comment on previews, etc. On Tumblr, reblogs are the best, and send in asks! Our teams are all working exceptionally hard to deliver a memorable experience to Horizon fans, and seeing our fan works shared is beyond appreciated.

Everything we have been working on has been 100% volunteer work, made by fans, for fans.

---

Q: What determined the looks/style/etc. of the game and the characters?

A: Beyond our standards for the sprites, all route artists had free rein and were responsible for choosing what Aloy wore and what style they drew their routes in!

---

Q: How did you decide which romance options to go with/ Why is there no [character I ship Aloy with]?

A: Every ship featured in Focus on the Heart is here because of volunteer teams who wanted to write and draw for them. When FOTH was first brainstormed, @chloefraazers put a call out on Tumblr with information about the project and asked for volunteers. In this ad, she tagged the major ships of Horizon, and in the post she mentioned that we are open to other ships if there was a writing and artist team able to commit. In addition, she put the call in the multi-ship Horizon server, and @kittleskittle reached out on Twitter. It took about a week for the teams we have to fill up, and there were initially others that had interest (we had a writer for a Yarra path, and an artist for Ikrie) but unfortunately neither could get full teams together. In the interest of moving forward, we went ahead with 8 – and a nice balance between female and male love interests!

---

Q: When do the events of Focus on the Heart take place?

A: Our stories takes place around 3 months after the events of the Burning Shores DLC and her adventures in the ruins of Los Angeles. During this time, she’s been recovering from an injury and poring over datapoints with Beta and Sylens, searching for anything to help prepare for the looming threat of NEMESIS—until she receives a message regarding a companion’s goings-on that piques her interest.

#focus on the heart #foth #foth dating sim fangame #foth visual novel fangame #horizon forbidden west #foth: FAQs

[owlswatch]

Six Sentence Wsunday

Some preliminary writing for The Long Fic. This may or may not be in the final product; it's most useful as a way to experiment with tone.

(Aloy/Sylens, 140 words)

Her fingers found the place where wire slipped under skin, traced the join and the strange ridge where the wire anchored. Dirty nails picked at the bottom of the blue cord. She liked the intimacy of it, the time she could take to explore the quirks of his body. Liked him quiet and soothed, knew how much disbelief anyone else would feel faced with the idea of him so still under her hands. 

He dozed quietly. She stroked his back. She wondered whether her next question would make him twitch.

“Who is the woman who runs the Sons of Prometheus?” She asked.

Sylens turned to look up at her, his face pillowed in the crook of his elbow. His eyes looked tired, blood-stained. Aloy’s hands stilled. She jabbed a finger between two cords, not roughly but more playful than soothing. 

#horizon forbidden west #aloy/sylens #writings

[the-horizon-lounge3041]

What if Burning Shores began a little differently?

Burning shores was a good addition to the Horizon story, it helped flesh out Aloy’s character more and helped her realize something about herself (that is she is capable of falling in love with someone) and it showed us a new setting as well as new machines and gets us pumped up for the third installment to this incredible franchise. As a fan, I always like writing fun little things as a “what if this happened?” And that is what todays writing is about.

It starts out normally. Aloy gets a call from Sylens, they meet up and chat about the 13th Zenith, Aloy flys to the Burning Shores. On her way, Beta calls and tells her to be careful, (cute sisterly moments that I NEED in game no.3) as Aloy approaches she gets shot out of the sky and falls towards a beach.

This is where it starts to go the “What if?” direction

(Honestly this is kind of a FeralLoy thing😂)

Aloy lands in a fishing trap, she gets tangled up and ends up hurting herself trying to frantically escape, Then a woman named Seyka hears grunting and decides to go check out the source of the noise. She pulls out her bow in case if it is a machine, she jumps out of the corner of the rock and sees Aloy tangled in the trap. Seyka carefully approached her and cuts the trap loose. Aloy runs out limping and eventually runs out of breath, she crashes in a small cave on a different side of the beach. Covered in wounds and is in desperate need of help, she went to call Beta but her focus was missing, she figured she lost it from falling off her sunwing and her rough landing.

As Aloy panics and feels like she can’t even move, Seyka tries to help her clean her wounds and help her try to heal. But Aloy glares and shows signs of *I don’t trust you* (which would be pretty reasonable because she just met her, and is just starting to understand trusting a lot of people) Seyka states that she isn’t leaving the area due to machines being around and Aloy is in no shape to protect herself. Aloy just growls in frustration and rolls over, Seyka chuckles “I think I can get you to warm up red…at least it’s worth a shot”.

The next day early in the morning, Seyka brings supplies for herself (and for Aloy if she decides to let Seyka help her) As Seyka makes breakfast, she’s wondering if Aloy will come over to eat, but Aloy doesn’t budge she instead decides to look through her rations which is empty. Seyka thinks to herself that Aloy may be tough to befriend, Aloy mutters to herself about not trusting Seyka and isn’t sure if her intentions, and how her food smells good. As Aloy is short on food options, she’s getting hungry. This leads to Seyka hearing her stomach growling and then asks if she would like food because she sounds hungry. Aloy starts crying and confesses she’s starving. Seyka chuckles, gets her a bowl of food and tells her there is no need to get upset.

After the two share a meal and start getting properly acquainted with one another, Aloy apologizes for her behavior from before, introduces herself, and lets Seyka help her with her wounds and get back on her feet, while all of this is happening, Aloy starts to feel something she’s never felt before, she is in denial at the moment, but she may have caught feelings for this Quen.

And from this point on it’s just regular Burning shores what canonically happens, it’s just Seyka and Aloy having a few extra days with each other and having a rocky start when they meet.

Hope you enjoy this!

(Also I’m aware that the boards have poor grammar, I was pretty darn tired when I was adding dialogue but it’s okay this is all for practice 😂)

#horizon forbidden west #horizon zero dawn #beyond the horizon #horizon burning shores #burning shores spoilers #burning shores #Seyka #seyloyfanart #Seyloy #aloy art #aloyshipping #aloy despite the nora #beta sobeck #hfw #beta #hfw aloy #aloysobeck #aloy #writing #rewriting #feral aloy #seykafanart #aloy x seyka #hfw seyka #cute #au #horizonfandom #horizonfanart #digitalart #art

[greybackpack]

I FUCKING KNEW IT.

I AM AT THE END OF HORIZON FORBIDDEN WEST AND I THOUGHT THE VIBES WERE OFF WITH TILDA AND I WAS RIGHT. GAHHHHHH.

Also wow, she really hasn’t learned anything. Like a thousand years of regretting and lamenting and pining because Elisabet rejected the idea of leaving and she’s like ‘yeah, this version who I think resembles Lis at her best would totally leave the world to the doom-AI that I helped create.’

She was ready to make Aloy go though, so she learned somewhat from her regrets.

This has implications for my version of Lis and you know what? Lis is also going to learn from her regrets- about not punching Ted when she had the chance. I AM SO EXCITED TO WRITE.

ALSO THAT HUG AT THE END IS SO CUTEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE. BESTIES. SISTERS. I AM NORMAL ABOUT THESE TWO BEING LITERAL FOUND FAMILY. AHHHHHHHHHH!!!

Also Sylens. Wow. Character development.

#hfw tilda #elisabet sobeck #aloy #aloy despite the nora #horizon forbidden west #sobeck sisters #sylens #tilda van der meer #Tilda’s lost it a Little #like a lot #a thousand years and people go insane ig??