Far Zenith

"The lesson will be taught in due time, Aloy. Until then, we wait."

This article contains heavy spoilers. Read ahead with caution.

Far Zenith's logo

Far Zenith was an Old Ones think tank organization that was responsible for the revival of the Odyssey colony ship project and the creation of Nemesis.

The surviving Far Zeniths serve as the primary antagonists of Horizon Forbidden West.

History[]

Far Zenith was described as a "futurist consortium" that claimed to comprise seventy-seven of the world's wealthiest persons. The organization was very secretive and their spokesperson, Osvald Dalgaard, was the only publicly acknowledged member, while also serving as their mouthpiece.^[1]

Far Zenith Model K Ectochamber — Remains of a Far Zenith Model K Ectogenic chamber in ruins

Far Zenith's public goal was to extend humanity's domain to other star systems, and in 2061 they purchased the Odyssey project, which had been abandoned four years earlier due to conflicts among the parties involved in its operation.^[2] In reality, its true goals were for the world's elites to escape what they perceived to be a world doomed to collapse for any number of reasons; economic instability, biological warfare, rampant AI, etc. When knowledge of the Faro Plague became public in 2064, Far Zenith accelerated the Odyssey's reconstruction time table.

Far Zenith provided their ectogenic chamber technology and data to Project Zero Dawn in exchange for a copy of APOLLO, allowing Patrick Brochard-Klein to borrow from their technological advances to develop his own ectochamber model for use in ELEUTHIA Cradle facilities.^[3] From that point, Far Zenith monitored Zero Dawn closely. However, before the deal was finalized, an attempt by Far Zenith to steal a copy of GAIA itself was discovered and foiled by Elisabet Sobeck and Travis Tate, who sent a logic bomb in retaliation. This led to Sobeck firmly and definitively dashing any hopes of Far Zenith securing such a copy. Despite this, Tilda van der Meer was still able to convince Sobeck to hand over a copy of APOLLO.

In 2065, Far Zenith's efforts were reported to have ended in failure when the Odyssey apparently exploded after it attempted to leave the Solar System.^[4] This, however, was a lie; intended to cover their tracks so no one else might follow them to Sirius.

Colonization and fall of Sirius[]

Three hundred years later, the Odyssey arrived in the Sirius system, where it successfully established a colony. Under the leadership of Gerard Bieri, Far Zenith made massive technological advancements, including extending their lifespans to the point where they were physically immortal. This allowed the original Far Zenith consortium to survive over a thousand years, indulging themselves in virtual reality. Some members of the Far Zenith were not satisfied with physical immortality, however, and desired something greater: a form of digital immortality that would allow them to download their minds into any form, organic or mechanical.

Nemesis was a failed experiment and byproduct of that pursuit, a collection of various copies of the Far Zenith human minds. The experiment was ultimately deemed a failure, however, and Nemesis was locked away—but not destroyed—by the consortium. In this state of forced isolation, Nemesis gained sentience, grew to despise its creators for its imprisonment, and sought to destroy them by any means. When Nemesis finally escaped on January 13, 3012, it was able to utilize its vast knowledge bank to hack Far Zenith's entire civilization, destroying it in a matter of hours. With so little time to prepare, the consortium did not realize the danger Nemesis posed until it was far too late. Once Nemesis took control of Far Zenith's machine printing facilities, it was able to produce any conceivable machine form, allowing the malignant Nemesis to track Far Zenith not only on their own planet, but also across space. It thus followed them to Earth.

It is currently unknown exactly how many of the claimed seventy-seven members of the original consortium actually traveled on the Odyssey to Sirius - to secure funding for the project, Dalgaard recruited far more members than the ship could carry, and those declared to "lack(s) the skillset for our future aims", such as Dalgaard himself, were quietly eliminated to open berths for others with the ability to pursue the group's ultimately successful goal of immortality. Of the members that escaped to Sirius, only thirteen survived the annihilation of the colony: Gerard and Tilda, as well as Erik Visser, Verbena Sutter, Walter Londra, and eight unnamed individuals.

Return to Earth[]

Even as the Odyssey set a return course to Earth, Nemesis sent an Extinction Signal that triggered HADES to render the planet nonviable for the Zeniths, forcing GAIA to self-destruct to avert this. Knowing that Nemesis would keep pursuing Far Zenith after HADES sent a signal back and living with intense fear of their own creation which was capable of anticipating their every thought, Gerard devised a plan to steal a backup copy of GAIA, at which point Far Zenith would leave Earth to die at Nemesis' hands and use GAIA to build another planet for themselves. To this end, they created a clone of Elisabet Sobeck, whom they named Beta, in order to access old Zero Dawn facilities that required Sobeck's Alpha clearance. As they restricted Beta's access to APOLLO, she remained unaware of Nemesis' existence or the Zeniths' true plans, leading her to believe Far Zenith sent the Extinction Signal and were planning to take Earth for themselves. Once on Earth, Far Zenith established a base on a distant island and created an army of Specter combat drones to secure their position. Londra, however, grew weary of his overbearing colleagues and departed the group to plot his own escape from Nemesis.

Tilda, Erik, Gerard and Beta hunted numerous facilities in search of a Gaia backup until they arrived at LATOPOLIS, a HADES testing facility, having been anonymously tipped off by Sylens, who had learned of the Zeniths' existence through HADES. After Beta finally recovered a GAIA backup, albeit lacking the subfunctions, the four discovered the existence of a second Elisabet clone, Aloy. Being unaware of Beta's existence, Sylens assumed that the Zeniths would take Aloy alive. However, Gerard labeled her a redundancy and ordered Erik to kill Aloy despite the protests of Tilda. Erik's shielding rendered him invulnerable to any attack from Aloy, but he failed to take his opponent seriously, inadvertently allowing her to escape.

Both Gerard and Erik assumed Aloy was dead and gave up the search. Tilda, however, returned to LATOPOLIS and found and repaired the huntress' destroyed Focus. In viewing its data, she learned of Aloy's life and judged her to be the superior version of Elisabet Sobeck, her former lover. She also learned of Sylens and his involvement in manipulating Regalla's Rebels. If Regalla succeeded in killing Hekarro and seizing leadership of the Tenakth, she'd then lead the full force of the tribe in a suicide attack on the Zenith base.

The Zeniths proceeded to hunt down the subfunctions of GAIA to complete the AI, capturing ELEUTHIA, and ARTEMIS, with APOLLO already being in their possession. Beta, however, having grown weary of the psychological torture of the Far Zeniths, went rogue. Having convinced the Zeniths to give her their GAIA kernel under the belief it would accelerate ELEUTHIA's acquisition, Beta locked herself in an ectogenic chamber to prevent the Zeniths from finding her, and also sent a distress signal to GAIA to get Aloy to find her. Gerard dispatched Verbena to bring back Beta, only for her to be attacked by a group of Tenakth rebels and Sons of Prometheus, who used a specialized weapon made by Sylens that disabled her shield, resulting in her death. After her death, Aloy arrived with her allies Varl and Erend, and eventually managed to bring Beta back to her base.

Gerard deduced that Aloy would be going after HEPHAESTUS, as it was the subfunction most important to GAIA's completion. Thus, the Zeniths began tracking HEPHAESTUS through the cauldron network - meaning that, despite Aloy's efforts to the contrary, they were able to locate the rogue AI the moment Aloy, Beta, and Varl captured it in Cauldron GEMINI. Gerard, Tilda and Erik entered the facility to confront Aloy and retrieve GAIA - Erik swiftly incapacitated Aloy, killed Varl, and retrieved Beta, while Gerard took GAIA and the still unmerged HEPHAESTUS. Before Gerard or Erik could kill Aloy, however, Tilda betrayed the Zeniths, choosing to escape with Aloy.

Aided by Tilda and her allies, Aloy launched a full-scale assault on the Far Zenith base in a last-ditch attempt to free Beta and stop Far Zenith from escaping with GAIA. Although they were massively outnumbered by the Specters, Aloy had Beta unleash HEPHAESTUS into the Far Zenith computer network, allowing it to rapidly manufacture powerful combat machines that overpower the Specters despite their highly advanced nature. Gerard, Erik, and the other Zeniths confronted Aloy and her team, with Gerard boasting of their invulnerability. His overconfidence was shattered when Sylens used his device to permanently disable their shields. Erik and Gerard were the only Zeniths to flee in time, with the rest of the organization overpowered and slain by HEPHAESTUS' machines.

While Tilda pursued Gerard to the top of the base, Erik was defeated in battle by Aloy, and finally killed by Varl's lover, Zo. After Aloy freed Beta and the two discovered the truth about Nemesis, Tilda killed Gerard in front of them and revealed her ultimate goal: to force Aloy onto the Odyssey so they could escape together, which Tilda saw as a do over for her decision a thousand years before to leave Elisabet Sobeck, Tilda's former lover and the source of Aloy's genetic code, behind. When Aloy refused to abandon Earth, Tilda piloted Specter Prime in a desperate attempt to incapacitate and kidnap Aloy. Instead, Aloy destroyed Specter Prime and Tilda was killed in the resulting explosion.

With the organization all but dismantled, Londra was the only member of the Old Ones to remain until he met his own end in the Burning Shores.

Legacy[]

Although Far Zenith's plans to acquire GAIA resulted in their collective demise, their greatest mistake, Nemesis, still poses an existential threat to all life on Earth.

Despite their disregard for most of humanity, self centered and downright megalomaniacal personalities, the positive contributions Far Zenith made cannot be ignored. The ectogenic chambers they provided to Project Zero Dawn were an invaluable asset to ELEUTHIA, making them partially responsible for humanity's restoration after the Plague. The alpha build of APOLLO they were given was the only known copy to survive Ted Faro's purge, and upon their demise, it was returned to GAIA, saving humanity's collective knowledge from oblivion. But with the centuries of APOLLO being integrated within the civilization of Far Zenith, it is most likely the knowledge of how the organization achieved their incredible technological advancements are now apart of the subordinate function’s databanks. Alongside the Far Zenith base being mostly intact from the raid, this presents the chance for Aloy, beta and GAIA to utilize these resources and give the tribal humanity a decent head start to stopping NEMESIS, ironically thanks to its creators.

Society and culture[]

Far Zenith was composed of the wealthiest people on Earth who managed to achieve physical immortality, which Beta speculates to be a combination of pharmaceuticals, cellular treatments and technological implants. The majority were considered pathologically narcissistic, but some outliers were considered amiable individuals. When Far Zenith established their colony on Sirius, their society felt into cultural stagnation, concerned with living in virtual reality while machines tended their needs. Tilda believed the colony could've been a utopia if her fellow Zeniths didn't waste the past thousand years. Following Nemesis' uprising, what few surviving Zeniths treated the tribal humans on Earth with disdain, referring to them as bugs or worms.

Far Zenith possessed the most advanced technology in comparison to the tribes on Earth. Nanotechnology was woven into every aspect of their arsenal, from spider-like Specters, to their gauntlets. Far Zenith also possessed machine printers that rapidly created machines with nanotechnology at speeds faster than any Earth-based Cauldron. Each Zenith possessed a personal energy shield from convention attacks, though GAIA speculates that a sustained attack from Zero Dawn machines could have penetrated Zenith shields, and they were also capable of flight.