#Chief Hekarro

[thefandomwritersblog]

...Though she had always acknowledged his attractiveness in passing, this encounter left no room for doubt. His physique was beyond impressive, sculpted with precision like a work of art in motion. Every scar on his skin added depth and richness to his already broad form. The soft candle light bathed him in an ethereal glow, accentuating every muscle and contour. Water droplets clung to him like jewels, enhancing the play of light as they cascaded down his glistening body.

@elysiumnightmares you have once again knocked it out of the park.

[aescela]

Hekarro's Attire Combines All Three Clan Styles - An Essay.

The Tenakth as a whole in Forbidden West have a very distinct way of making armor that follows the basic concept of "Cover as little skin as possible with the most aggressively spiky machine parts you can find".

However, all three clans - Sky, Lowland and Desert - have unique style elements that none of the other clans use. Their Chief, Hekarro, wears armor that incorporates details from all three clans.

1. Lowland Clan - Cheek Armor

The Lowland Clan is not only unique for their excessive use of feathers in their attire but also for wearing pants, most likely because of how overgrown, swampy and bushy their territory is. Neither show up in Hekarro's outfit but he does wear the trademark cheekbone adornment many Lowlanders have.

2. Sky Clan - Fuzzy Furs

Of all clans the Sky Clan inhabits the coldest climate. That doesn't stop them from going topless in the snow half of the time but they still are the only clan using animal furs in their attire for warmth. Another unique element are the small turquoise beads for trimmings (that Kotallo wears in his hair btw).

3. Desert Clan - Spikes for days

The Desert Clan has a few unique style elements (for example the way they shave their hair to look like jet tail fins or the bandanas to protect mouth and nose from dust) but the most striking is their heavy use of spikes for trimmings and edges, as well as long spokes woven into their tassets and skirts. Hekarro has a lot of those and his famous kitchen knife cape might have been inspired by this.

Hekarro's goal in life is to unite the Clans as one and to forge friendships with other tribes, and I absolutely adore how this is reflected in his outfit and how much thought and detail went into this game.

(All concept art used as examples is taken from Artstation and belongs to Guerilla and their respective creators that are listed on the images.)

[goldmolamola]

brings back memories of your own kulrut, doesn’t it?

[claudiaeparvier]

[foxtober]

Handsome Big Man

[felrend]

That is a whole man right there

[ceo-of-sloppy-men]

I made a chart of all the fictional characters who live in my head rent-free... this is pretty telling

[pikapeppa]

Alright, why wouldn't Hekarro wanna use Carja glyphs as the Tenakth writing system? The Phincian alphabet is the basis for most of the writing systems in Western Europe - if you got a writing system that works, why not adapt it?

I'M FINALLY ANSWERING THIS ASK TWO MONTHS LATER 😂

For anyone who's curious, the context for this was a post I made a while back in response to an ask regarding whether the Quen might be able to read Chinese, since the Focuses they would have found in the Great Delta would plausibly have been formatted in Chinese. In the tags on the post, I remarked that I had a rant about Hekarro wanting to borrow the Carja writing system. Everbright has asked me to elaborate, and now I'll finally be writing the essay that's been sitting at the back of my mind for like a year LOL.

My thesis here is as follows: it's not the idea of the Tenakth borrowing the Carja writing system that bothers me, necessarily. I take umbrage with the fact that Hekarro seems to think the Tenakth are inferior to the Carja because they aren't a literate society. 

This post is going to get long, so I will put the rest behind a cut to give anyone a break who wants to scroll on past LOL. Also, please note: trigger/content warning for mentions of residential schools in Canada.

First things first: I'm writing this as a non-indigenous Canadian, so I may be writing with biases of my own that I will apologize for in advance. If any members of the cultural groups I'm going to mention should read this and take issue with anything I've said, please do feel free to write me a message here on Tumblr!

Okay, let me set the context here. When Aloy first meets Hekarro, a piece of their conversation is as follows, with the transcript to follow:

Aloy: I’m sorry about Fashav. He seemed like a good man. Hekarro: More than a man. A bridge between Tenakth and Carja. No outlander ever earned our respect as he did. I had hoped he would be my voice in Meridian. That peace with the Carja might become something more. A: An alliance? H: An exchange. The Carja have much we lack. Our deeds are written in ink upon our bodies. Our memories die with our flesh. But the Carja never forget. Their deeds are written in book and scroll. A:  You wanted to learn from them? H: As I learned from Fashav. He will be missed.

This conversational exchange has always bothered me, because inherent in this exchange is the idea that Hekarro views the Tenakth as being lacking compared to the Carja -- that the Carja are superior to the Tenakth because of the fact that they're able to read and write, rather than tattooing their history on their skin. This statement reflects a bias that feels very 'colonizer' to me in an icky way. Being a literate society does not inherently make you superior to a society that doesn't use writing, but that exact idea has been used tons of times in history to argue that the indigenous cultures of a place are less advanced/less intelligent/less valuable than the people who are coming in and trying to force their ideals, including literacy, on the indigenous group(s). In the context of Canada, for instance, Kirmayer et al. (2009) wrote that "aboriginal peoples were viewed as incapable of understanding and participating in democratic government, thereby motivating efforts to 'civilize' and assimilate them into mainstream Canadian society," with that mainstreaming process including residential schools: institutions that took indigenous children from their families and communities and placed them into segregated spaces where they were forbidden from speaking their native languages, practicing their traditional customs, and from contacting their families at all.

This is especially irksome to me because the Tenakth tradition of tattooing (or "ink", as they call it in-game), is based on tattooing traditions IRL with an extremely rich historical and cultural background. The most obvious similarity is to Polynesian tattoo (or "tatau") practices, which I'll focus on here, but similar methods with equally rich histories exist in the Philippines and in Japan. 

One of the most striking things about Polynesian tatau practices is that it's not just the act of striking ink into the skin that matters; it's the meaning behind the act of getting a tattoo, and the embracing of community and identity inherent in the practice. As one Samoan tatau artist said, "it's important to know the meaning behind the symbols of our traditional tatau so you have a deeper understanding of the significance of what you're wearing. Each 'maman' or each pattern has its own meaning and story behind it." Polynesian artists also highlight the fact that these traditions are passed through the generations for thousands of years, and that those who wear tatau are "wearing the maps of our ancestors." As another artist said, Polynesian tatau is "a reconnection to all my ancestors and everybody behind me, because I'm not only speaking for me, but a whole generation of kids that are like me, that are getting Polynesian tattoos to reconnect." 

Tenakth tattoos, like Polynesian tattoos, are a way of recording history and lore -- not only one's own stories and victories, but those of the people that are important to a warrior, as evidenced by Kotallo stating that he plans to ink Varl's deeds on his own skin in tribute. I also personally think that it's culturally fitting for the Tenakth to record important history on their bodies, since the Tenakth place such emphasis on physical strength. It makes logical sense that they would record their proudest deeds on the thing that they view with such pride, i.e. their physical bodies. Hekarro's statement that the Tenakth are "lacking" because they don't record their history "in book and scroll" feels like a devaluation of the Tenakth's culturally-specific method of recording history, much in the way that colonizing societies have devalued the oral traditions of North American indigenous groups. Oral traditions are an extremely important aspect of many indigenous cultures; a group that provides indigenous culture training has stated that "certain stories are never written down, which preserves the tradition of sharing knowledge, culture, and history orally. These stories are the fabric of the community’s history, knowledge and culture, and some are thousands of years old. In some cultures, if a story is written down it is degraded." By ignoring this rich tradition and imposing written records of those stories, they would be degraded and rendered less than what they're meant to be.

Now, some of you might be asking whether it was an oversight/mistake on the part of the Guerrilla Game writers that Hekarro made this accidentally-denigrating comment toward his own tribe. Honestly, I do think it was an oversight, and one that I find disturbing, because it seems to stem from a blind spot that GG isn't aware of. This isn't the only time that content coming from the Horizon world seems to follow this 'colonizer'-like idea of certain societies being more advanced and superior to others. In the concept art book for Horizon Zero Dawn, for instance, there's a description of the Carja as follows (p. 47), transcript below:

 [Transcript: Among all the tribes of Horizon Zero Dawn, the Carja Sundom boasts the most advanced culture. Using the advantages of their geographical position, the Carja have developed agriculture and trade while other tribes still rely on hunting and gathering. The Carja's impregnable capital, Meridian, provides security for a civilized population. Artisans and traders flourish here, serving sophisticated, well-to-do citizens. Carja civilization towers over the other tribes, just as the Sun of their religion rises above the horizon of their mesa valley.]

Even worse, there’s this passage from p. 48, where the non-Carja tribes are called “primitive”.Transcript below:

[Transcript: Through ages of perfecting the techniques of machine plate-working, the Carja have developed the most sophisticated way: to apply the materials of mechanical fauna. While more primitive tribes would roughly affix more or less useful machine parts on their garments, Meridian artisans interweave fine fitted machine elements into comfortable and functional pieces.]

Quotes like this make me worry that there are people at GG who aren't recognizing their own bias inherent in the description of the Carja compared to other tribes. There seems to be a lack of awareness here about the dangerous underpinnings of seeing one culture as more "advanced" than another just because it is more dominant or mainstream. As Shaw (2001) states, "in not according recognition, let alone respect, to the distinctive linguistic and cultural identities that have shaped First Nations peoples, the majority culture continues to exert a significantly negative influence on identity, on self-esteem, on pride in one's cultural heritage, and on one's sense of self and of place in the broader society."

To summarize to some degree: I don't have a problem per se with the Tenakth borrowing the Carja writing system. My qualms come from the idea that the idea of the Carja being superior will come along with that borrowing, thereby devaluing the rich tradition of Tenakth tattoos. As Hale (1992) states, "while it is good and commendable to record and document fading traditions, and in some cases this is absolutely necessary to avert total loss of cultural wealth, the greater goal must be that of safeguarding diversity in the world of people. For that is the circumstance in which diverse and interesting intellectual traditions can grow."

TLDR: Tenakth tattoos are just as valid and important a method of recording lore and history as Carja writing, and the Tenakth are not inferior or primitive for not having a tradition of reading/writing. I think Hekarro's comment about the Tenakth being "lacking" is reflective of a blind spot at GG that I hope will be addressed in future games. 

If you came this far, THANK YOU FOR READING and accept this cookie as thanks for staying with me! 🍪😂 A friendly final note: do be warned that any replies or comments to the effect of "but literate societies ARE inherently better than illiterate ones" will be removed and the writers of such comments may be blocked, depending on their intentions as I read them. 🥰

-- love from your friendly neighbourhood Pika xoxo

[socialfilter]

headcanoning HFW characters’ favourite machines because I can:

Aloy: Easy, it’s her Sunwing. No ifs, buts or maybes. It’s her damn bird, might be her favourite because Beta gave it to her, might be because she seems to quite like heights. I should also include Tallnecks, purely because I just love the way she interacts with them.

Talanah: Now I want to say it’s Stalkers but tbh that’s my personal preference. For Talanah, it’s most likely Stormbirds. If that girl could have a pet, it’d be a Stormbird. Change my mind.

Kotallo: It has to be said I absolutely adore that boy. His favourite machine is either the Tremortusk or Behemoths. Honestly if you found him a mount, it would be a Behemoth because they’re such big bastards - I just think he likes them.

Zo: Grimhorns and Plowhorns. Easy peasy.

Varl: I like to think it’s Chargers. They’re the machines he learned to ride and was the first one he got to interact with after Aloy gave him a Focus.

Erend: For Erend, although he hates machines, he does have a favourite and that, for me, is Fireclaws and Frostclaws. Anything that would take one hell of a smack from his hammer to take down, he likes. Fireclaws are absolutely huge and he likes a challenge. If it’s not the bears, it’s definitely Widemaws.

Alva: Alva doesn’t hate machines but she doesn’t like being near them. If we were talking personality-wise, it would probably be Burrowers because they’re not too threatening and let’s face it, pretty cute. That being said I like to think, if she looks at them from a distance, it’s Tiderippers.

Beta: Burrowers. At some point, she’ll override one and use it as an assistant to help her make things. You know she wouldn’t tell Aloy about it either and chaos would ensue.

Regalla: Slitherfangs, ‘nuff said.

Yarra: Yarra doesn’t have a favourite. Meat is her favourite. (it’s totally Rockbreakers)

Drakka: Drakka’s favourites are definitely Thunderjaws. The meaner the better.

Dekka: With Dekka, I think she’d have a favourite machine she could ride that wasn’t initially fearsome-looking but could still pose a threat if she wanted it to. For that reason, it’s Bristlebacks.

Hekarro: Slaughterspines and Rollerbacks. He’s such an imposing figure, I reckon his taste in machines is the same.

Fashav: hmmm I struggle with Fashav because we don’t know him awfully well. But I think it would be a machine that is something you’d also find in the Sundom so…Ravagers?

Elisabet: Look I know she’s dead but you can’t tell me she didn’t have her favourites. Aside from GAIA and her obvious sub functions, I think her favourites would be Grazers. They’re non-threatening and pretty normal to look at. If it’s not Grazers, it’s Plowhorns.

Tilda: Again, she’s probably barely seen any actual machines but I think - if we’re talking Aloy’s world, it would be Sunwings or Scorchers. Sunwings because I think they’re quite elegant when they’re not squawking all over the place. Scorchers because idk, if they were domesticated animals they’d give off ‘I’ve been expecting you Mr Bond’ sorta vibes. does that make sense?

——————————————————————

Me, I have too many personal favourites. It’s probably Dreadwings, Stalkers, Tiderippers and Shellsnappers. Anything massive or anything that can turn invisible - I’m in.

[thefandomwritersblog]

As he gazed at her tear-streaked face, he could feel the weight of her emotions—a mix of sorrow and awe that threatened to overwhelm him. It was a stark contrast to the tempestuous fury that often burned within her, but in this moment, she was stripped bare, revealing a raw vulnerability that both terrified and enraptured him.

~~

Many thanks to @infernaldaydreams for taking another one of my commissions! I cannot even begin to describe how much of love and appreciate your style, your dedication, and the care you put into each piece you've lovingly crafted. There is no one else I trust more to create Victoria and Hekarro. You are simply the best!

[aescela]

Eyes like embers. The lighting in the throne room just begged to take some pictures of the Chief.

[goldmolamola]

the previous group of marshals!

i basically drew parodies of the Chojin Sentai Jetman and Kyoryu Sentai Zyuranger openings where they show the character lineup (because i was feeling nostalgic and i think the marshals would translate to a toku series easily).

thanks to Daniel Gutierrez Anaya's ArtStation page for reference on the marshals we only saw for one scene.

[aron-mp4]

Uhhhh,,, Hekarro

[mamemomo-chan]

~ Heartbeat of the Raintrace ~

Here is my participation for the @horizonbigbang, it was a very cool challenge :D

Here is @garbage-dono​ (Twitter : @/donogarbage) wonferful fic, for wich I’ve done the drawing :3

Heartbeat of the Raintrace

[gnollgrin]

A Hekarro! Done with the pens that had migrated to my bedroom headboard and then a smashed around layer of watercolor.

[felrend]

More Hekarro appreciation