Ashe lifted her hand instinctively, bringing her palm in front of her face as the light overwhelmed her eyes. For those few seconds, everything was engulfed in a pale blur merging everything together.
Gradually though, things returned to their separate forms again. The sky was the first thing she saw. It was clear and perfectly blue, without a single cloud in the horizon.
Below it, the terrain revealed itself as a mixture of wild vegetation, rusted remnants of old mechanisms left to decay under the sun, and ruined structures that blocked the light in places, creating small havens of shade where mushrooms and other species grew.
But, to Ashe's surprise, there were people too.
At first she thought she was hallucinating, but as her sight cleared, she realized there were three… no, four figures standing within that space. One of them stood slightly apart from the others, kneeling near the ground with his attention focused on something she couldn't distinguish.
The remaining three had already turned toward her.
Their clothing was unlike anything she had seen so far. Worn fabric was wrapped tightly around their bodies, set in place with belts running across their backs and waists. They looked meant to shield them from the sun and whatever else this place might throw at them, while still letting them carry supplies with ease.
Ashe lowered her hand slowly.
"Who are you?" she asked, visibly confused.
The three men exchanged quick glances, equally surprised by this new turning of events. After a moment, one of them stepped forward, closing the distance to where she stood.
"We could ask you the same thing, miss," he replied.
Ashe instinctively stepped back. Her eyes quickly scanned the walls around her, searching for Seven's familiar dark markings that had guided her until now. When she couldn't find them, she considered the possibility that maybe the outside was some sort of limitation. Maybe Seven couldn't reach out here. But if that were the case, he would have said something before… wouldn't he?
"I don't know who I am," she said. "I woke up inside this place." She then gestured faintly at the structure behind her. " I had been inside a pod for… I don't know how long. I don't remember anything before that."
The men listened carefully to her story.
"I really don't know who I am. Can you help me?" she pleaded.
The three exchanged another look, as if trying to make sense of her words between them.
Before they could respond though, Ashe found herself speaking again, asking almost instinctively.
"Are you… Emergents as well?"
Now that word made all the difference in the world.
To someone more attuned to reading people, the change in their expressions might have been obvious. Ashe, however, wasn't in such a position to assess others, since everything around her was basically untested territory.
The man who had previously stepped forward sighed as if things had finally started to make sense.
"Yeah," he said. "We are."
The others gave slight nods in agreement.
"That explains it," another added. "You've just woken up, haven't you?"
Ashe nodded slowly.
"Not long ago."
"Well," the first man said with a gentle voice, "you're not the first one we've seen. We've met others like you before. We know how disorienting it is… we went through it ourselves."
He took another step closer.
"There's a town not far from here," he continued. "You can come with us if you want. You know, get some rest and figure things out properly."
Ashe considered what they were offering.
"There's shelter there," the man clarified. "And other people like us as well. Emergents. You won't have to wander around like this."
That was indeed what she had been looking for, but could she really trust them? She wasn't sure what to make of it. Before she could answer at all, her thoughts returned to what had brought her there in the first place.
"I need to find Harmonic Seeds soon," she said. "I think there's supposed to be a cluster nearby."
The men exchanged glances again.
"You don't need to worry about that right now," one of them said, dismissing it with a slight motion of his hand. "We've got what you need back in town."
"You can stabilize there," another added. "There's no point in risking yourself out here in your condition."
Ashe hesitated even though their words did make sense. The effort of reaching the cluster had already taken its toll on her and the idea of getting to a place where others like her existed, where she could rest and finally understand more about herself was indeed more than appealing.
She also remembered how her stubborness hadn't worked in her favor in the past and how it had led her to the Drift encounter.
Even so, something in her remained uncertain.
She glanced once more at the walls around her, still expecting Seven's markings to appear again and contradict what she was hearing. Yet nothing came.
"…Alright," she said slowly. "I'll go with you."
The men seemed satisfied with that.
"Good," the first one replied. "We'll take you there then."
Behind them, the fourth man had risen to his feet. He stood a short distance away from the group, paying attention to what was happening. Ashe noticed him only briefly at first but now that they had all decided on what to do, she became more aware of his presence.
The men began to move and Ashe followed. They guided her along the outer edge of the structure, toward an area where a large, rusted metal frame stood embedded into the ground.
"What's going on?"
A voice asked from somewhere behind.
Ashe turned slightly and noticed how the fourth man had approached them, looking directly at the newly formed group.
He had dark hair and bright green eyes that stood out against the rest of his appearance. A mask covered his mouth, obscuring most of his features, so Ashe couldn't make them out clearly. He was dressed much like the others, with small bundles of what looked like plants tied at his side.
"Nothing you need to worry about, boy," one of the men responded almost immediately. "Go back to your plants over there."
There was a slight shove, meant to redirect him away from there. He didn't resist it, but he did glance back at Ashe for a brief moment, then stepped back toward the area he had been studying earlier.
Meanwhile, the rest of the group kept moving.