jeodStuck in Aperture Join Date: 2017-04-12Member: 229591Members
I really like this story! It truly shows you what it was like for the character and how terrifying planet 4546B is (we really need to give it a proper name...)
I also enjoyed the way you merged in the actual events that happened, it is pretty apparent that someone did their homework
I really like this story! It truly shows you what it was like for the character and how terrifying planet 4546B is (we really need to give it a proper name...)
I also enjoyed the way you merged in the actual events that happened, it is pretty apparent that someone did their homework
Jeff had gotten very little sleep. He woke up quite early to begin preparations getting no more than about 4 hours of sleep. That is, if you call tossing and turning all night on the cold hard floor of a life pod 'sleep'. The first thing he started on was the repairs for the seamoth. From his storage he was able to get enough titanium to patch up the hull and got some rubber and copper to fix some of the wires. After about 2-3 hours, the seamoth was back in business. Now he could focus on provisions. According to the coordinates the Sunbeam had given him, it would take him about 5 hours of travel in the seamoth to reach the landing sight. The sun was at around a 6:30 position, although Jeff had noted earlier that the days on this planet are quite a bit shorter than Earth's yet deceptively similar enough to trick you into thinking you have more time than you really do. It might be closer to 3:50 by the time he got to the waypoint. Sixty minute hours were still sixty minute hours, however, so regardless of what the planet's time was, he knew it would take him about 5 hours to get there, meaning he would need some food, water, and a plan B if he ran into anything particularly frightening out there. He had no more nutrient blocks so the next hour or so was spent capturing various animal life, scanning, and experimenting with what tasted good and what nourished him sufficiently. At the end, he had concluded that a fish he affectionately called 'Peepers' had the most protein content and an enjoyable flavor similar to that of cod. Peepers were quite difficult to catch, however, so Jeff found another, more accessible fish with similar qualities called 'hoverfish'. These guys hung out in and around the kelp forest so there was always the dangers of stalkers but if one simply waited outside the kelp long enough, a hover fish would eventually come too far out of the safety of the kelp and become an easy catch since they were fairly slow. Jeff gathered a few of these creatures and cooked them for later. Next, he gathered up enough water. Having obtained several filtered water bottles from the Aurora, he had plenty of water left over once he had packed enough into the seamoth. The last thing he needed was batteries to replace the dying ones in his seaglide and some flares to mark the landing site. After another hour of gathering and fabricating necessary materials, he was ready to go. He hopped into his seamoth.
"Alright, let's get the heck off planet Hell6B, Sally!"
"Agreed."
Jeff fired up the engine and set out.
~~~
Palmer gasped as he pulled off the helmet. The life-pod console flashed 'Oxygen 4%!'. He was sitting on one of the side chairs. Floating around him were several odds and ends, scrap metal, batteries, a water bottle, some rubber, a bit of glass, some wires, and a repair tool.
"I was thinking I would be a bit luckier than this..." He thought. "It's still enough for what I need to do, though, as long as I get it done fast."
He had just come back from material gathering and his oxygen tank had run completely dry. Palmer let go of the chair and got to work. The systems he needed to fix were the the OMS, the solar panels, and the flotation deploy system. He began with the solar panels, anything to provide some decent illumination. The light coming in from the hatch and the faint red flashing light on the console weren't cutting it. Some glass, a few replacement wires, and some welding and the solar panels were as good as new. Once the solar panels started charging up, the light in the pod shifted into red emergency lights. Oxygen levels at 3%. Next he began working on the OMS (Orbital Maneuvering System). With a few replacement wires, and some more welding, they were back online. Oxygen levels at 2%. Just to get things started, Palmer went ahead and let out a strong burst from the OMS to send the pod tumbling toward the planet. Once he got deep enough in the atmosphere, the oxygen systems would begin harvesting the oxygen from the atmosphere of the planet. That is, if the planet even has oxygen in its atmosphere. The fact that it was an ocean planet gave Palmer hope that that was the case though. While the pod made its way toward the planet, he worked on the flotation system. Lots of rubber, lots of replacement wires, some titanium, and some welding and they were also back online. Oxygen levels at 1%. Palmer let go of his welder and went to the manual OMS controls. He fired them as fast as they could go in the direction of the planet. The pod began hurtling through the debris field toward the planet. The sound of metal scraping and tiny fragments hitting the pod as it built up speed made it seem like he was in a violent sand storm. He finally came out of the debris field. Oxygen levels Critical. Palmer stared out the hatch burning determination and desperation filling his eyes as he focused on the planet. The OMS systems were still going until Palmer heard an automated warning.
"Maximum safe velocity for atmospheric entry reached!"
Palmer let off on the OMS and rechecked all the systems muttering under his frantic breath.
"Ok... parachute is good, flotation, solar panels duh, oxygen harvester... good good good alright... I'm going to need to start holding my breath... literally."
Oxygen level 0%!
Palmer got into one of the seats, locked the bracer in place, and took in one big breath and held it there. There was likely not a single breath left in the pod. The pod continued to race through space toward the planet. It got closer and closer, filling the whole hatch view. Palmer's lungs felt like they were on fire. The planet got closer and closer. Burning red started appearing on the outside of the pod. He was in atmosphere but not deep enough to be breathable. The corners of Palmer's eyes slowly went dark and his vision very slowly reduced to tunnel vision. His head started to feel tremendous pressure as if either his head would explode or his chest would burst to release the oxygen from his body. Just keeping his eyes open suddenly felt like the hardest thing in the world. At this point Palmer couldn't tell if the hatch had opened and set his body on fire from the immense friction of atmospheric entry or if his lungs were literally combusting and setting his body on fire from the inside. His hearing had been reduced to an incessant ring. To relieve the pressure, he slowly let out a breath through his nose. He knew that once he did this he wouldn't be able to inhale again. He would have to hold just a bit longer. What little vision he could see at the end of the dark tunnels started to blur and Palmer struggled as he felt himself begin losing consciousness. Suddenly, a muffled noise sounded that Palmer was unable to interpret. He shifted his gaze to the console. 'O+yp3n b3lng groce55eb, l m0m3n7 pi3a53' with a swirly progress symbol was all that was on the screen. Suddenly, it clicked in his mind what was actually going on. The console finally switched to another set of words that he could barely make out, '0+yb3m L3uaIz 1%'. Palmer inhaled the biggest breath he had ever taken. The oxygen filling his lungs would have caused him to shriek in pain if he had had enough breath to actually shriek. Though it caused him great pain, he inhaled and exhaled deeply over and over again coughing and sputtering. After another few moments of intense pain, each breath got progressively more comfortable until each breath was the most refreshing thing he had ever felt. He coughed a bit more and blood began trickling out of his mouth down his chin as gravity began pulling harder on his pod. He wiped his mouth and held tightly to the chair. Suddenly, the parachutes deployed and with a hard jerk, Palmer was knocked unconscious.
The trip was fairly uneventful. The path between the pod and the waypoint mostly consisted of kelp forest which eased Jeff's mind. He had traveled most of the distance and was approaching fast. With a twinge of alarm, Jeff noticed that the kelp forest he was breezing through was becoming more sparse and started to switch to deep, dark open ocean. He slowed down a bit. Though he was fairly deep under the surface and could see the bottom of the kelp area, the terrain began to slope down into darkness now. Fear crawling up his spine, Jeff slowly continued forward. The waypoint was only a few minutes away. Where was this land-mass the Sunbeam had informed him of? After several minutes of slowly creeping forward, a steep wall of terrain appeared out of the darkness.
"Oh... here it is."
Jeff began pulling the seamoth up to the surface still cautiously looking around for any creatures that might show themselves in this darkness. He broke through the surface and the sun pierced through his fear and he relaxed a bit. The land mass was right in front of him. A steep mountainous bit of land much smaller than Jeff had originally imagined.
"How are they going to land on this thing? ... And come to think of it, how did I not see this sooner?"
He then started to guide his seamoth to the left following the edge of the island. Eventually, he came to a flat beach area that jutted out of the mountain just above sea level and followed it around the back. The hud indicated that that beach was the landing sight.
"If this is the best spot they could find, there really must not be much land on this planet.
Jeff edged the seamoth up to the sand and disembarked. The sand was very comfortable and warm compared to the cold hard floors of the Aurora. Jeff reached inside the seamoth storage hatch and pulled out a few things and began walking toward the landing zone.
"Detecting massive energy signature." Sally said.
"Hmm, Sunbeam must already be coming in."
As he came around a rock formation, Jeff immediately dropped his things and stepped back in shock. There, only about 100 yards away, was a massive, vertical structure unlike anything he had ever seen. It was several stories tall and consisted of a gray metal and strange green lights. A triangular opening that lead from the beach into the structure was filled with flickering green light that looked much like some sort of barrier.
"What in the name of... What the heck is that!?"
Jeff stood there standing for a moment unable to fully understand just what exactly he was looking at and why it was here.
"Sally, what can you tell me about this massive structure?"
"Evaluating, one moment." ... "Structure is the source of the previously mentioned energy signature of that surpassing nuclear fission. Building materials constructed out of unknown alloy with unprecedented integrity. Only known entrances are marked by the triangular opening on this beach and another sub-bay entrance approximately 150 meters below sea level. Several hundred years old. No life signs detected. Further analysis will require you to gain entrance as the structure's outer shell prevents scanner penetration. Unknown origins. Unknown purpose. Unknown function."
Jeff began walking toward the structure and glanced at the sun.
"Not too long before they get here."
As he neared the green energy barrier, a pedestal in front to the right of the entrance burst open and a purple symbol could be seen in the slot that it revealed. Jeff cautiously approached it and took out his scanner.
"This device appears to be alien in origin and is connected to a nearby forcefield. The technology is far beyond anything encountered before by the federation. Nonetheless, it appears to function like a normal lock requiring only the correct kind of access key."
"Huh... weird... Apparently, uh, aliens built this? But why? How? Where are they now?... are they like humans? Or... or are they like the movies? I guess the most important question would be: Are they hostile?"
Jeff searched around the forcefield and the terminal but found no way to tinker with the electronics or to find any object that matched the symbol inside the terminal.
"Huh... well if there's no one inside and its hundreds of years old, maybe its been abandoned, or better yet, maybe the aliens all died off so we won't have to worry about them. I know I'll be reporting this to the federation when I get back so they can send some research teams out here to find out more about it... If they can even get inside... Unprecedented integrity?"
Jeff decided he had better set up the flares before he got too side-tracked.
"Alright you're sure you're confident with the landing protocol?"
"Yes sir! It'll be a breeze."
"Alright, I sure hope so Westly."
Quinn turned to Carson, "What's our ETA?"
"About 30 minutes. Cloud cover is a bit dense in the landing area so we might not see the landing sight until we break through the clouds."
"Ok, what about our fuel Jerret?"
"We're still in the safety margin. Fuel preservation is still extremely important though, so when we land, we'll need to shut off the ship for as long as we'll be idle."
"Alright, scanners still can't distinguish any human signatures from the vast ecosystem here, but we have picked up two local distress signals from working life pods which means there are bound to be a few survivors. I just hope none of them are wounded. We don't have very much medical supplies."
~~~
Jeff sat on the beach relaxing up against some flat rocks with his hands behind him supporting his head. In a large patch of sand in front of him, he had lain a circle of flares that were still burning bright. He was relaxing in the heat of the sun with a toothpick he had made out of some plant material in the area hanging out of his mouth. He had just eaten one of the fish he had prepared and was feeling quite relaxed for some one who had been stranded alone on an ocean planet for 4 weeks. Well, he didn't consider himself entirely alone. If it hadn't been for the artificial companionship of Sally, he would have likely lost some of his sanity by now, but the frequent conversations, and the simple sound of another voice helped keep Jeff stable these long days. In fact, Jeff was feeling quite content right about now. The warm sun on his face, a full belly, the soothing sound of the sea on the beach, the occasional alien bird making some strange yet calming squawk, and the comfort of knowing the horrors on this planet would all soon be over. His eyes were closed and a tired smile graced his unshaven face. A distant splash was heard and Jeff opened his eyes and shielded his face from the sun with his hand. Not too far out in the water, a reef-back had breached the surface playfully turning over laying on its back for a moment before diving back under. Jeff smirked and laid back against the rock and closed his eyes again. Then, a more disturbing sound split the tranquility. A long, metallic creek and mechanical whine that thundered through the air. Jeff quickly sat up opening his eyes that instantly fell on the large alien tower. It was moving.
"What the..."
The whole upper part of the structure was extending into the sky becoming taller and taller. Eventually it stopped with a crash. Jeff was standing up now, intently watching the structure.
"Ok... so you can extend to be taller for no reason... cool."
Then, the tower began rotating. Doing a 180 degree turn. Then, the revelation came into Jeff's mind as the tower began angling itself from a pivot point at its base still pointing into the sky.
"Energy levels are spiking inside the alien structure. Power is being rerouted from an energy reserve in the base of the structure into the extended tower section and is increasing to extremely high levels there."
Jeff gasped and spoke under his breath, "Oh, my, gosh..."
"Sally! Is the sunbeam within communications range?!"
"Yes, this PDA's receiver is currently connected to the Sunbeam's systems."
"Patch me in! I've got to tell them to back off!"
"This PDA is not equipped with 2 way communication."
Jeff was about to say 'thanks sally", when he suddenly realize what she had said and he lost his breath for a second.
"Repeat?"
"This PDA is not equipped with 2 way communication."
"What the heck... Since when!?"
"Sally, what OS is this PDA currently running?!"
"This PDA is currently running: Universal Survival Protocol and Assistance (U.S.P.A.) OS version Vanilla 1.0.0 in tandem with AI Assistant program: Reconnaissance Planetary Assistant AI and Informative Relay (Re.P.A.I.R) 1.2.4. If any bugs are found, please have them reported; fore the safety of crash survivors and reliability of survival PDAs are important to the Alterra corporation."
Jeff could barely believe it.
"That version is outdated and was replaced by the 1.2.0 version as a mandatory replacement like 2 years ago for this very reason! How in the hecking heck are the Aurora's PDAs legally running outdated survival softwear!?"
Sally responded, "According to mandates, this OS system is outdated and should have been replaced. However, unable to determine why that protocol was not met by Altera construction and supply crew."
"So I can't contact the Sunbeam myself!?"
"Softwear for that action is not installed."
~~~
"Captain, we'll be breaking atmosphere in 5 minutes. The cloud cover should be dissipating in 4 minutes."
Avery Quinn squinted through the cockpit windshield trying to see through the clouds.
Jerret began speaking, "Captain, I'm detecting a massive metallic structure at our landing sight. Energy levels are extremely high. Did another ship beat us here?"
Quinn was surprised and paused for a moment, "No way, If there were a ship, we'd have picked them up ages ago and received their hailing signal."
"Then what could it be sir? With such high energy levels it would have to be a military class Ion cannon cruiser and the only known terrestrial versions of ion cannons are back on Earth. This is an unexplored planet, there couldn't be a defense cannon. It's gotta be a ship."
"Hmmm... can you get any structural readings?"
"Negative sir, the scanners can't seem to pick it up for some reason even though I know it should be able to especially at this range... All I get is the energy signature. The only thing I can think of that might be causing that would be some kind of military grade jammer."
"This doesn't sound good... Either some unknown federation military outpost is on this planet or some federation ship was doing some secret mission out here on the outer rim and got the distress call first..." Westly said.
"Oh that's just great, so we really DID jettison our cargo for absolutely jack-"
"Cool it Rainer! We can't even see it yet. Could just be a flipping volcano and that's why Jerret can't pick up any structural readings... because there is none."
"Um sir," Jerret informed, "If a volcano had that much thermal energy, it'd have to be erupting more violently than the volcanoes on Io and scans show the weather is perfectly normal... there's no way its a volcano..."
At that moment the clouds gave way and the planet surface was finally visible.
"Hey, our communications system has connected to a personal PDA! Some one's down there to replace its batteries!" Quinn said, "In fact, look! there's some one down there!"
Quinn opened the channel, "Aurora survivor, we have your PDA signature! I don't know how you walked away from that wreck, let alone survived since then, but we'll be happy to bring you onboard and hightail back to federation space. Stand back, we're approaching the landing site now.
"But sir, what about that weird structure to the left of him?" Westly said.
"I don't know but if its federation military they wont fire on us, we've got federation ID codes on this ship. We'll just go down there, pick up the survivor and head out."
"Wouldn't they have at least contacted us by now?" Jerret said.
Quinn looked at him, "That's true... Strange..."
Quinn turned back to the communication com, "Breaking atmosphere in 5... 4... 3...-" Suddenly, the whole cabin lit up in red emergency lights and a red graph appeared on the main console center screen. "What's that?"
Jerret stared at it, "The energy signature is building up... they... they're firing on us!!!"
"What!? Why would they do that?! We've got federation codes! Westly, evasive action, get us out of here full ahead flank!"
"SIR! THEY'RE FIRING!" Jerret screamed.
"GET TO THE LIFE POD!" Rainer yelled.
Everyone in the cabin leaped out of their seats and rushed to the door where a confused and drowsy Derek stood on the other side.
"What's happening guys!?"
They had no chance to respond. No chance to push past him. No chance to even fully comprehend the whole situation. One second they were there, frantically trying to escape, to save themselves. The next, they were gone. All of them. The ship was gone too. Nothing but a ploom of smoke and fire with tiny fragments of hull raining down from the sky.
Jeff couldn't believe what he was witnessing. Completely helpless as a green beam of immense power reduced the Sunbeam to falling debris in an instant. He fell to his knees for the second time on this God forsaken planet. The Sunbeam was gone.
Palmer's head snapped up from where it had been hanging loosely from his shoulders as the echo of a distant explosion jolted him awake. His slumped body became rigid again and his limp legs steadied themselves against the floor again. He was breathing heavily and blood caked the corner of his mouth and under his nose. A very small pool of dried blood collected on the floor. As he cleared the fog from his mind and began reaching full consciousness, he instantly felt a pang of immense pain in his stomach. The pain was so excruciating that he first thought he had been impaled by something lose in the pod, but upon looking down, he saw that he was fine and realized he was actually extremely hungry. Every few moments, a pulse of pain would ripple from his stomach throughout his abdomen and cause him to cringe.
"I've got to find something to eat... but... I'm all out of nutrient blocks..."
Palmer unlocked the bracer and lifted it over his head and stood up. His legs buckled beneath him, causing him to fall to the floor, and he realized how weak he was. It was at that moment he noticed his pod wasn't sloshing on the waves of an ocean planet.
"What?"
He glanced through the bottom hatch glass and saw dirt. He worked up the strength to grab onto the ladder and hoist himself up through the top hatch. As he stuck his head out he was instantly met with air fresher than anything he thought he'd ever breathe again and it filled him with vigor. Then he looked around. He was on an island filled with alien plant life and various sounds of unknown creatures. It was nearing sunset and he was in a dense patch of forest with strange seemingly blue, bioluminescent trees all around him obstructing his view. The parachutes had tangled themselves in the tops of the trees behind him with twigs and branches sticking through tears in the canvas. At the sight of plants, Palmer hauled himself fully out of the pod and rolled over the side falling hard onto the grassy ground. Wincing away the pain, he crawled up to the nearest plant. It looked like an orange and green melon with palm leaves growing straight up. He unholstered his scanner and rested his head on his arm as he propped the scanner up on the ground aiming at the plant and began scanning. When the scan was complete, he completely ignored the details of the plant and looked down at the survival information.
'Harmless. Possible good source of food.' was all he needed to see before he ripped the plant out of the ground and bit directly into the bulbous melon part. The bite revealed a tender green inside filled with water that reminded him of an unripe watermelon. The taste was similar too, but much more dull and less sweet. None of that mattered to Palmer though, the sight of water and the apparent safe edibility of the planet made it a God send to satiate himself. After fully devouring the plant, he rolled over on his back and rested there for a moment, regaining his strength as the pain from his stomach slowly subsided. He instantly noticed the giant moon that orbited this planet.
"How does that thing not crash into this planet... kinda creepy... but beautiful at the same time."
His energy restored, he slowly began to think about his situation.
"What was that sound that woke me up?... are there any other survivors?... where is this island in relation to the crash site?... Where's the Aurora?... Are there hostile creatures on this island?..."
Palmer sat up and tried to stand. It was difficult, but his energy was slowly returning. He made it back to the pod and climbed back inside. He gathered what materials he could from the pod's locker and came back outside.
"I need to get a better vantage point."
He looked to the sky and noticed a faint ploom of smoke.
"Wouldn't be surprised if that's the Aurora."
He headed off into the trees toward the smoke until he came to a lightly trodden path.
"Huh... what's this doing here..."
Palmer decided to follow the path. Eventually, it lead him out of the dense woods to some high ground where he saw that on either side of him were two small mountains. The strangest part however, was that there were what seemed to be old federation style observatories on both peaks. He decided to take the one to his left since it would take him in the direction of the smoke. Along the way, he scanned various plants discovering their edibility and benefits. The trek was short but very steep, taking every bit of Palmer's already dwindling energy out of him. Once he got to the top, he peeked around the corner of the observatory and saw the Aurora.
"Holy crap... the drive core must have ruptured... meaning... survivors are highly unlikely..."
He came back around the corner and went to the door of the structure. The metal of the observatory was rusted and covered in moss and rain weathering. The door was rusted open allowing Palmer to get a glimpse inside.
"Hello? Is anyone there?"
He stepped inside. The room hall was very small. In a little indention in the wall were two pots containing very large plants that had likely been growing there for years. Palmer recognized them as Chinese potato plants, a common emergency plant seed used in many ship's survival kits.
"There must have been others who crashed on this planet before the Aurora... but how long ago? Are they still alive?"
After gathering several potatoes from the plant for later, he headed down the hall to the observation bubble where there was a desk, a chair, and an overgrown PDA. Palmer tried to scoot the chair to the side to take a seat but, through all the weathering, the chair had become stuck to the floor requiring a bit more effort from Palmer to push it free before he could sit down. He scraped off the moss covering the PDA and picked it up. He wiped the screen down with his elbow and tapped it. Nothing. Then he heard the sound of it rebooting. The screen didn't light up, but the audio was working. He told the PDA to play last recorded voice log. After a few moments of static and pops from the damaged speaker, the audio began playing.
"It won't work, Chief. There's nothing left of the Degasi. No building materials on this island. And my nose tells me the weather's turning. We're gonna have to get our feet wet."
"This island is safe, Marguerit! There are no predators. We can grow food. Why would we abandon it?"
"Your kid says we can't grow enough. Not without more growbeds. Speak up, kid."
A third voice, a young male, began speaking, "It's... it's true. The natural growth rates are too slow to support three of us indefinitely. Especially if the weather gets worse."
Marguerit sighed, "All I'm sayin' is, ocean's got us surrounded. No use hiding."
"I've made my decision. You two want to forfeit your commissions just to take a swim?" The cheif asked.
"Believe me, I'm thinkin' on it."
The voice log ended abruptly. Palmer sat for a moment trying to understand what he had just heard.
"So... These are the ruins of the survivors of the Degasi ship that was lost to the Mongols several years ago... And it sounds like they wanted to go underwater... maybe that means they're still alive!... I hope... I don't want to be the only one on this planet for God knows how long..."
Palmer got up and went outside gazing at the Aurora again and the surrounding area as the sun began to set. He couldn't be sure, but he could have sworn he saw a large, skinny red tail splash up above the water before it slipped back under the surface just behind the Aurora's engines. Palmer then decided he had better get back to his life pod and start a fire before it got too cold in this fast approaching darkness.
Jeff couldn't quite tell how he felt. His mind was swirling with negative thoughts and emotions. Depression, anger, grief, confusion. He steadily became more and more depressed and grief stricken. Every time he tried to focus on one particular thought, his mind took him down a dark path that ended with a sinister option: suicide. He tried to find the silver lining, tried to think of something that would bring him out of this deep dark hole that was paralyzing both his body and his mind. He was thinking to himself, fighting himself, trying to escape from his own mind.
"This is a dream..."
"No, you know full well this isn't a dream."
"There is no hope."
"No! There must be hope, something I'm not thinking of."
"There's nothing to be done, no one to rescue you, no one to comfort you."
"No! I'm never alone! God is with me."
"There is no God, what foolishness is this? Take out your knife and end it all now."
"No! I can't! I won't!"
"What good is it to struggle? No hope, no help, no choice. End it now."
"NO! Ther- There IS a choice! There is hope! I-I'm... Yes, alive! I'm not dead yet! I can still fight to stay alive! I can get of this planet some how! I can pray! I can press on! Suicide is never a valid answer!"
"But-"
"No, there is no but! I'm going to climb out of this hole! I'm going to survive! And I'm going to find out why this- this gun shot down the Sunbeam! I'm going to destroy it and get off this planet and there's nothing that can stop me!"
And with a splitting scream, Jeff pounded his fist into the sand as his rage pulled him out of the hole of insanity. He stayed there, breathing hard, staring at the sand as the sky continued to darken as the sun set.
"God, give me strength... I- I can't deal with this alone..." he muttered.
Jeff stood up and tried to calm himself.
"I need to get back to the pod and gather more materials... If- If I'm going to be here for a lot longer, then I'm going to need a home more suitable then an 8x10 floating metal prison."
Jeff bent over and retrieved his PDA from the sand and wiped it off.
"Sally, bring up a document file."
A text box and a keyboard appeared on screen. Jeff began writing goals for himself, something to keep him motivated and to keep him focused.
1.SURVIVE!
2.Find out more about the alien structure and figure out a way to disable it.
3.Build a ship and get off this stupid planet.
4.Build a better home.
5.Get a Cyclo-
Jeff was still typing when a notification popped onto the screen and Sally began verbalizing, "Picking up a distress signal from life pod 37."
Ok, I'm so sorry guys! I've been really distracted lately. When I wasn't busy with life things, I've been devoting a lot of my time on the subnautica forums to reading Bugzapper's 'Aurora Falls' and 'Borealis Rising'. I hope none of you think I've lost interest or have quit though! This story is still pressing forward and you can expect more entries very very soon!
Ok, I'm so sorry guys! I've been really distracted lately. When I wasn't busy with life things, I've been devoting a lot of my time on the subnautica forums to reading Bugzapper's 'Aurora Falls' and 'Borealis Rising'. I hope none of you think I've lost interest or have quit though! This story is still pressing forward and you can expect more entries very very soon!
I can relate. One day, I restart reading Aurora Falls, and when I finish, not only do I realize I read Borealis Rising, I also realize it's two days later.
Jeff had been sleepily heading back to his pod. He remembered that not too many hours ago he had washed his hands of that claustrophobic tin-can and yet now, he was forced to return to its safety. His eyes were barely open with his head propped up by his arm against the armrest of the seamoth. The sun had fully set now and the night had settled in.
"I'll check out that distress signal tomorrow. Hopefully it'll have some useful salvage."
Jeff reached the pod and climbed his way inside where he collapsed on the uncomfortable floor.
"This will be the last time I sleep here."
And with that thought, he shut his eyes.
In the morning, Jeff sat up from the floor and rubbed various points on his back where his bones had pressed hard against the metal floor. He had already been awake for an hour, unable to stay asleep for long in the tossing of the pod on the waves. He got up and began transferring all of his things out of the pod and into the seamoth's storage. He had enough materials to begin building his own more spacious base but he needed a hand-held constructor first. To make a constructor, he would need a computer chip and a battery. He had several unused batteries, but no computer chip. Jeff hoped the life pod he would be visiting soon would have a computer chip or salvage materials to craft one. After cramming all the materials and equipment he could into the seamoth, he then took a dive-reel he had crafted a while back to tie the mobile vehicle fabrication platform to it. Once he was all set, Jeff finished off a water bottle while sitting on the top of the pod and hopped into the water. He climbed up and into the seamoth and set off toward the distress beacon. Jeff made a mental note that the pod was sending a continuous signal meaning it was still operational. Survivors however would be quite slim. The beacon was coming from an area dangerously close to the radius of the radiation leak and there was still another day or so before the Aurora's particle field would fully clear the radiation. The signal was quite a distance and would take him into the open ocean area that Jeff now referred to as the grassy plateaus due to the red grass coverage and the strange vertical, segmented pillars that rose from the flat terrain. Though he had only found reefbacks to be native to this biome so far, he still wondered what other creatures might wonder their way into it for a reefback snack... or worse, a human snack. As he came out of a branch of kelp forest into the grassy plateau, he kept his eyes open for reefbacks. If he hung around them, anything big enough to eat one might go for one of them instead of him. There were several pods of reefbacks around this area today and their presence was reassuring for Jeff. While he was traveling, Jeff had been thinking about his goals and various other projects to work toward. One of which would be tricking out his seamoth. The way it is now, the seamoth is a very fast and agile little sub with a small storage bay and a decent power supply. However, the minimal depth capability and the lack of defense mechanisms left Jeff feeling that modifications would be the best next goal after he began the construction of a more permanent home.
"Sally, bring up the base construction menu."
A holo screen appeared to his right with a listing of all known structures. He noticed that what he was looking for was not listed.
"Sally, what structure is required to make modifications to this seamoth submersible?"
"That would be the MoonPool Submersible Bay. This structure's schematics are not currently known."
"Hmmf, figures... I'll probably be forced to go back into the Aurora to look for the schematics database."
By this point the grassy plateau started to give way to much deeper and darker ocean.
"Oh boy, here we go."
Jeff brought the seamoth down with the terrain as it sloped deeper and deeper until the sand gave way to coral-covered rock and dropped off abruptly into the darkness. Through the murkiness, he could make out some faint light coming from the darkness. Jeff continued to descend.
"Warning, reaching safe depth margin. Further decent will result in hull failure."
Jeff instantly shot his eyes up to the top of the seamoth's pilot bubble where a depth counter was displayed and he realized he had almost forgotten about it.
"Maybe it's a good thing I can't go deeper yet..."
Jeff looked for the distress signal's waypoint on his hud but suddenly realized it wasn't there. He looked around and found it again. It was coming from ahead of him on the surface.
"Huh, woulda thought it would have sank into the depths... Maybe the pod's more intact that I thought."
Jeff started heading forward out into the darkness and slowly ascended up toward the surface. After a few minutes of closing the distance to the waypoint, he suddenly noticed light coming out of the darkness above him in strange splotches unlike that of the sun shining through the surface. He slowly got closer until a sharp spike of rock appeared in front of him out of the murk. The stalactite of stone was covered in various table coral and other growth.
"What? How is this just floating here?"
He maneuvered around it and got closer to the strange light and suddenly stopped in his tracks when he realized he was only twenty yards from a giant, pulsating, pink blob attached to the underside of a stone structure. Jeff looked around and noticed there were more of those pink blobs dispersed between a forest of those stalactites. He followed the underside of the structure until he found an opening big enough to fit a cyclops right in the center of it. Jeff broke through the surface and was amazed at what he saw. A forest. He had surfaced in a pond in the middle of what seemed to be an island. Cliffs of stone rose up around him the tops of which were covered in plant growth of all kinds. To his right was a ledge of sand that lead into a cave. Jeff could barely believe it. It was all so beautiful, yet so impossible. The plant life on the other mountain island was so sparse and plain. How is solid rock floating like this? Jeff had to know. He resubmerged in the seamoth and went up to the closest globular mass of pink. Getting out of the seamoth immediately reminded him of the first upgrade he wanted to add to the seamoth: built in scanner. He swam up to the mass and began scanning it with the hand-held. The percentage counter went up slowly and every second Jeff floated there in dark open ocean gave him a very dreadfully nervous feeling. This place was even deeper than the grassy plateaus or the area round the mountain island. He tried not to look down but he knew he had to keep an eye out for danger. Finally, the scan was complete and he quickly hopped back inside the safety of the seamoth. Sally then began verbalizing the gathered data.
"Structural analysis reveals that this entity is made up of two separate species. The pink main body and inner jaws are the dominant creature. The outer, gel-like substance is a mesh of microorganisms capable of forming a sealed vacuum around the creature's jaws. A thin layer of helium is stored within the outer membrane, providing buoyancy.
Assessment: Further research required"
"Huh... interesting... So this whole island isn't connected to the ground but rather held in place by these little buggers."
Jeff resurfaced, parked the seamoth up next to the sandy ledge, and disembarked. Standing on solid ground was always a great feeling for Jeff even if the ground was only twenty feet thick and unknown depths of ocean lie directly below him. He breathed in a deep refreshing breath and looked at the sky above. There were bird calls similar to what he had heard on the mountain island which reminded him of the alien nature of this island and warned him to proceed with caution. Then he saw the smoke. It wasn't coming from the direction of the Aurora, it was coming from some where on the island, and Jeff had a pretty good idea of where.
The night had been cold as Palmer had expected. His survival PDA indicated the temperature was around 13 degrees Celsius. Not too cold, but uncomfortable enough to warrant a fire. During the night, he had foraged around in the "woods" for materials and fuel for a fire. In his search, he had found the ruins of a 3rd base built by the Degasi survivors. It was quite destroyed and half of it was covered in a land-slide. Inisde, however, he found several useful materials such as some old silicon rubber and some silver. For titanium, Palmer simply took out his welder and removed small sections of the old structure. It was very inefficient in terms of cutting compared to the laser cutter, but he was able to accumulate a fair amount of titanium that would suit his needs. Back at the pod, the fabricator broke each material down into its basic elements and reconstituted them into a survival knife. Using the knife, he inspected the trees in the area and discovered that the tall bioluminescent trees were very similar to the wooded trees of Earth but more along the lines of very thick and dense plant stalks. This would have posed a problem considering the amount of water contained in plant stalks, however, the liquid inside these trees was actually quite flammable, even more so than tree sap back home. The liquidy sap was blue and produced its own light which indicated that the sap was the origin of the trees' bioluminescence. Whatever materials constituted these trees, Palmer didn't really care as long as it burned well. After building a fire near the life pod, he made a bed of leaves to sleep on. He ate another marble melon and fell asleep. In the morning, Palmer felt better than he thought he ever would again. He felt that he had some strength behind his muscles now and was more confident in his survival chances. During the night, he had received a distress signal from life pod 5, 6, and 27. Only one of those signals continually pinged indicating the rest were either destroyed or damaged. Additionally, the PDA's AI had indicated to Palmer that the area on the outskirts of the island surrounding the Aurora were heavily irradiated but that strangely, the radiation levels were slowly decreasing which meant, some how, the particle containment field was still online.
"That's a plus. Won't have to worry about getting radiation poisoning in a few days."
Palmer struggled to put out the fire. The sap was like oil and he made a note to himself to be very careful next time he made a fire. Once the fire was finally smothered, Palmer set out in search of more useful materials. He made another stop at the abandoned base for more deconstruction for titanium and other various metals like copper and gold. There were a few lab materials in the base as well. Samples of what seemed to be some of the underwater life on this planet. One looked liked a punctured mushroom, and the other resembled shelf coral or giant lichen. On his way back, he gathered plant materials as the AI had indicated they posed a good source of fibers. He then fabricated a flashlight and a reinforced dive suit using the synthetic fibers made from the plant materials. The suit would defend him against the crab creatures he had encountered a few times on this island and, if he ever dared to do so, would help him breathe at greater depths in the water. Palmer was starting to realize that this island's resources were very few. Food and water was about the only thing that this island provided naturally, the rest was gathered by the Degasi survivors from underwater. He knew it would only be a matter of time before he would have to take a dive to find some resources. He wanted to be fully prepared for whatever this alien ocean had to throw at him. He had already seen evidence of massive creatures when he saw that large red and white tail and he didn't what to find out the hard way if they were aggressive or docile. He would need some kind of vehicle and the seamoth was the only one he thought he could remotely obtain the materials for at this stage. He hoped that he would be able to find those materials in the 3 degasi bases, otherwise, he'd still have to take a swim on his own. Palmer was walking up a path. He had already completely dismantled and looted the main Degasi ruin and was now heading off to deconstruct the two observation pods at the tops of the two mountains. He was at the fork in the road about to choose which one to go for first when he heard a large splash. A splash much different from that of lapping sea water, and it didn't come from the shore, it came from the center of the island. Palmer decided to investigate further and left the path into the dense plant life.
~~~
Jeff was about to head into the cave to try and find a way to reach the surface when he heard some stirring in the trees above him. He looked up and his eyes widened.
~~~
After only a short distance of hacking through large leaves and dodging trees, Palmer came to a cliff edge. Down below was a pond and in the center of it was a seamoth. Confused, Palmer looked around the edges of the pond. There, on a sandy ledge, stood his dearest friend, Jeffery Masterson, and he was looking right at him.
"You're alive?!" they both said semi-simultaneously.
"Are you ok?!" Palmer called.
"Yeah I'm, pretty ok, much better now seeing you alive! You?"
"Things are going pretty well for me actually!"
"What, did your pod land on this island?"
"Yeah, and it was a miracle too, because I was about to starve to death and there are several types of edible plants here! Uh, By the way, How did you get a seamoth in a pond in the middle of this island?"
"This island isn't your typical island! It's actually floating completely separate from the sea floor! I can tell you more later! Wait right there, I'm coming up!"
Jeff dashed off into the cave. The cave was very straight with a somewhat consistent size all the way through. It slowly sloped upwards until he came out in the middle of the forest. Palmer made his way to him and they clasped arms.
"I never thought I'd see you again," Jeff said.
"I wasn't to hopeful either Jay, but looks like it turned out well in the end! How many others made it?"
Jeff's face instantly lost its smile and his eyes averted to the ground.
He sighed, "When the Aurora initially landed, there were several life pods online with survivors." He took in a breath and looked up, "The Aurora's quantum reactor went supercritical and exploded which not only disintegrated the entire front 4th of the ship, but output extremely high amounts of radiation in a kilometer radius. Anyone who may have survived on the Aurora itself, was killed by the blast. Anyone within the radiation area are long gone. I've been finding capsized pods in several locations and if no one died of malnourishment or the aggressive fauna around here, the radiation eventually got them. There's a 99% chance you and I are the only ones left..."
Palmer's face became sober too, "Wow... I honestly didn't think it'd be that bad... I didn't think anything could be as bad as the situation I'd been in..."
"Yeah, what's you're story? You're pod's signal is still coming in meaning its intact. How come I didn't get the signal much sooner?"
"I was stuck up in space until yesterday. When I jettisoned from he Aurora, I launched from the side opposite the planet. There were several explosions at the same time too. The debris battered my pod until several primary systems failed. I was stuck up there with nothing but a flickering oxygen display and life support."
Palmer continued relaying the story of how he'd salvaged wreckage in space and guided the pod toward the planet, barely harvesting oxygen in time.
"Wow, and I thought MY situation was bad..."
"Hey, lets walk up this way, I've got some materials to gather while we talk."
Palmer and Jeff began walking back up to the path Palmer had originally been on. Meanwhile, Jeff told his story of dealing with the pod fire, his discoveries of the world below the surface, and the tragedy of the Sunbeam. By this point, they had walked all the way up to the abandoned observation pod that faced the Aurora and Palmer had begun dismantling it.
"You mean some alien gun shot down the Sunbeam?!"
"Yeah, and the power I saw it unleash makes me think that IT is what brought down the Aurora too!" Jeff said sitting on a cliff edge looking out toward the Aurora.
"Heck... this whole situation is just getting crazier and crazier. First the Aurora goes down, then we're the only 2 surviving souls out of the whole bloody crew, and now it looks like there's malintent behind this whole thing!"
"This is the unfortunate course of events that we have been thrust into I'm afraid."
"So, what's our plan?"
"Well the first goal I think we need to strive for is building an appropriate base. After you and I have been stuck inside a claustrophobic tin-can for this long, I think you'll agree that a more suitable home is in order. The fact that this island exists is even more of a blessing too! We can build a base here and not even have to worry about stalkers or those serpentine shark things... still have no idea what to call them."
"How about Reaper? By your description earlier, sounds like death incarnate."
"Basically."
"On your note of building on this island. I've explored the majority of this place and as you can see, there are ruins of previous survivors from many years ago, the Degasi. I've been reading some of their logs and apparently, this planet has a really harsh hurricane season. They thought like we did: set up shop on the island and won't have to worry about the dangers of the ocean. We'll have food and life'll be good. Well, when hurricane season hit, they were forced under. Anything we built on this island might be great for a while, but would be a complete waste later on and the Degasi didn't leave any kind of calendar so we have no idea when it might hit."
"Really? That ruins that idea... Well, we can at least harvest the usable plantlife here and try and sustain it in a base. Our first step toward that goal, however, needs to be getting you a seamoth. The waters around this island are very deep and easy territory for any, uh, 'reaper' who wants to waltz in for a snack. I brought my mobile vehicle bay with me so we just need to get the materials and I'll fab one up for ya."
"Sounds good. I've been dismantling these bases with a welder to get the materials I need for just that reason."
"Dang, must be slow going without a laser cutter."
"Yeah it is, you don't happen to have one do ya?"
"Nope, but I can help you with my own welder."
"Great, now give me a hand with this."
After nothing but tragedy after tragedy, things were starting to look up for Jeff now that he had the real human companionship of his friend Palmer. Jeff wondered in the back of his mind, 'for how long it would last?'. However, he quickly dismissed that thought.
@ThunderShock27, is this a fan story about your secret desire for multiplayer?!
You diabolical fiend you...
@Skope , While i will never deny that I would have loved multiplayer in this game, this story is in NO WAY related to the desire for it to exist and isn't connected to any of my other threads. The origin of the idea of Palmer surviving and helping Jeff was a pure spur-of-the-moment decision that was entirely influenced by Jamezorg's quote here:
This whole story is being written as I go, not pre'fabricated' (haha puns), using the game's lore as the main timeline. I thought it would be a great idea because, while strictly following the subnautica lore right on the dot might still make for a good story, the introduction of unexpected factors that DON'T happen in the real game add to the excitement, drama, and intrigue of the story. Introducing Palmer as an unexpected catalyst in the story makes way for much more interesting possibilities for the reader to contemplate. Will Palmer make it to the planet? Will Jeff ever find him? Will Palmer survive the landing? Will Palmer survive in these harsh waters? Will they both make it off the planet together? These are few of many possibilities that introducing Palmer as a factor presents. Because Jeff is based entirely off of the character you play as in the game and since I'm following the events of the actual game's lore, everyone kinda has an idea of what is going to happen to him. Ah, but NO ONE knows what will happen to Palmer since he is an entirely unique character to the story. This is how I begin to play with your mind... in an exciting, adrenaline filled way of course.
Your comments can, in some very subtle ways, influence the story, friends.
Thank you all for helping me reach 3.2k readers! This story has really grown into something really special to me and I'm so happy you all are enjoying it!
Comments
I knew this day would come... I wasn't prepared enough.
I also enjoyed the way you merged in the actual events that happened, it is pretty apparent that someone did their homework
Jeff had gotten very little sleep. He woke up quite early to begin preparations getting no more than about 4 hours of sleep. That is, if you call tossing and turning all night on the cold hard floor of a life pod 'sleep'. The first thing he started on was the repairs for the seamoth. From his storage he was able to get enough titanium to patch up the hull and got some rubber and copper to fix some of the wires. After about 2-3 hours, the seamoth was back in business. Now he could focus on provisions. According to the coordinates the Sunbeam had given him, it would take him about 5 hours of travel in the seamoth to reach the landing sight. The sun was at around a 6:30 position, although Jeff had noted earlier that the days on this planet are quite a bit shorter than Earth's yet deceptively similar enough to trick you into thinking you have more time than you really do. It might be closer to 3:50 by the time he got to the waypoint. Sixty minute hours were still sixty minute hours, however, so regardless of what the planet's time was, he knew it would take him about 5 hours to get there, meaning he would need some food, water, and a plan B if he ran into anything particularly frightening out there. He had no more nutrient blocks so the next hour or so was spent capturing various animal life, scanning, and experimenting with what tasted good and what nourished him sufficiently. At the end, he had concluded that a fish he affectionately called 'Peepers' had the most protein content and an enjoyable flavor similar to that of cod. Peepers were quite difficult to catch, however, so Jeff found another, more accessible fish with similar qualities called 'hoverfish'. These guys hung out in and around the kelp forest so there was always the dangers of stalkers but if one simply waited outside the kelp long enough, a hover fish would eventually come too far out of the safety of the kelp and become an easy catch since they were fairly slow. Jeff gathered a few of these creatures and cooked them for later. Next, he gathered up enough water. Having obtained several filtered water bottles from the Aurora, he had plenty of water left over once he had packed enough into the seamoth. The last thing he needed was batteries to replace the dying ones in his seaglide and some flares to mark the landing site. After another hour of gathering and fabricating necessary materials, he was ready to go. He hopped into his seamoth.
"Alright, let's get the heck off planet Hell6B, Sally!"
"Agreed."
Jeff fired up the engine and set out.
~~~
Palmer gasped as he pulled off the helmet. The life-pod console flashed 'Oxygen 4%!'. He was sitting on one of the side chairs. Floating around him were several odds and ends, scrap metal, batteries, a water bottle, some rubber, a bit of glass, some wires, and a repair tool.
"I was thinking I would be a bit luckier than this..." He thought. "It's still enough for what I need to do, though, as long as I get it done fast."
He had just come back from material gathering and his oxygen tank had run completely dry. Palmer let go of the chair and got to work. The systems he needed to fix were the the OMS, the solar panels, and the flotation deploy system. He began with the solar panels, anything to provide some decent illumination. The light coming in from the hatch and the faint red flashing light on the console weren't cutting it. Some glass, a few replacement wires, and some welding and the solar panels were as good as new. Once the solar panels started charging up, the light in the pod shifted into red emergency lights. Oxygen levels at 3%. Next he began working on the OMS (Orbital Maneuvering System). With a few replacement wires, and some more welding, they were back online. Oxygen levels at 2%. Just to get things started, Palmer went ahead and let out a strong burst from the OMS to send the pod tumbling toward the planet. Once he got deep enough in the atmosphere, the oxygen systems would begin harvesting the oxygen from the atmosphere of the planet. That is, if the planet even has oxygen in its atmosphere. The fact that it was an ocean planet gave Palmer hope that that was the case though. While the pod made its way toward the planet, he worked on the flotation system. Lots of rubber, lots of replacement wires, some titanium, and some welding and they were also back online. Oxygen levels at 1%. Palmer let go of his welder and went to the manual OMS controls. He fired them as fast as they could go in the direction of the planet. The pod began hurtling through the debris field toward the planet. The sound of metal scraping and tiny fragments hitting the pod as it built up speed made it seem like he was in a violent sand storm. He finally came out of the debris field. Oxygen levels Critical. Palmer stared out the hatch burning determination and desperation filling his eyes as he focused on the planet. The OMS systems were still going until Palmer heard an automated warning.
"Maximum safe velocity for atmospheric entry reached!"
Palmer let off on the OMS and rechecked all the systems muttering under his frantic breath.
"Ok... parachute is good, flotation, solar panels duh, oxygen harvester... good good good alright... I'm going to need to start holding my breath... literally."
Oxygen level 0%!
Palmer got into one of the seats, locked the bracer in place, and took in one big breath and held it there. There was likely not a single breath left in the pod. The pod continued to race through space toward the planet. It got closer and closer, filling the whole hatch view. Palmer's lungs felt like they were on fire. The planet got closer and closer. Burning red started appearing on the outside of the pod. He was in atmosphere but not deep enough to be breathable. The corners of Palmer's eyes slowly went dark and his vision very slowly reduced to tunnel vision. His head started to feel tremendous pressure as if either his head would explode or his chest would burst to release the oxygen from his body. Just keeping his eyes open suddenly felt like the hardest thing in the world. At this point Palmer couldn't tell if the hatch had opened and set his body on fire from the immense friction of atmospheric entry or if his lungs were literally combusting and setting his body on fire from the inside. His hearing had been reduced to an incessant ring. To relieve the pressure, he slowly let out a breath through his nose. He knew that once he did this he wouldn't be able to inhale again. He would have to hold just a bit longer. What little vision he could see at the end of the dark tunnels started to blur and Palmer struggled as he felt himself begin losing consciousness. Suddenly, a muffled noise sounded that Palmer was unable to interpret. He shifted his gaze to the console. 'O+yp3n b3lng groce55eb, l m0m3n7 pi3a53' with a swirly progress symbol was all that was on the screen. Suddenly, it clicked in his mind what was actually going on. The console finally switched to another set of words that he could barely make out, '0+yb3m L3uaIz 1%'. Palmer inhaled the biggest breath he had ever taken. The oxygen filling his lungs would have caused him to shriek in pain if he had had enough breath to actually shriek. Though it caused him great pain, he inhaled and exhaled deeply over and over again coughing and sputtering. After another few moments of intense pain, each breath got progressively more comfortable until each breath was the most refreshing thing he had ever felt. He coughed a bit more and blood began trickling out of his mouth down his chin as gravity began pulling harder on his pod. He wiped his mouth and held tightly to the chair. Suddenly, the parachutes deployed and with a hard jerk, Palmer was knocked unconscious.
We finally have a name people!
The trip was fairly uneventful. The path between the pod and the waypoint mostly consisted of kelp forest which eased Jeff's mind. He had traveled most of the distance and was approaching fast. With a twinge of alarm, Jeff noticed that the kelp forest he was breezing through was becoming more sparse and started to switch to deep, dark open ocean. He slowed down a bit. Though he was fairly deep under the surface and could see the bottom of the kelp area, the terrain began to slope down into darkness now. Fear crawling up his spine, Jeff slowly continued forward. The waypoint was only a few minutes away. Where was this land-mass the Sunbeam had informed him of? After several minutes of slowly creeping forward, a steep wall of terrain appeared out of the darkness.
"Oh... here it is."
Jeff began pulling the seamoth up to the surface still cautiously looking around for any creatures that might show themselves in this darkness. He broke through the surface and the sun pierced through his fear and he relaxed a bit. The land mass was right in front of him. A steep mountainous bit of land much smaller than Jeff had originally imagined.
"How are they going to land on this thing? ... And come to think of it, how did I not see this sooner?"
He then started to guide his seamoth to the left following the edge of the island. Eventually, he came to a flat beach area that jutted out of the mountain just above sea level and followed it around the back. The hud indicated that that beach was the landing sight.
"If this is the best spot they could find, there really must not be much land on this planet.
Jeff edged the seamoth up to the sand and disembarked. The sand was very comfortable and warm compared to the cold hard floors of the Aurora. Jeff reached inside the seamoth storage hatch and pulled out a few things and began walking toward the landing zone.
"Detecting massive energy signature." Sally said.
"Hmm, Sunbeam must already be coming in."
As he came around a rock formation, Jeff immediately dropped his things and stepped back in shock. There, only about 100 yards away, was a massive, vertical structure unlike anything he had ever seen. It was several stories tall and consisted of a gray metal and strange green lights. A triangular opening that lead from the beach into the structure was filled with flickering green light that looked much like some sort of barrier.
"What in the name of... What the heck is that!?"
Jeff stood there standing for a moment unable to fully understand just what exactly he was looking at and why it was here.
"Sally, what can you tell me about this massive structure?"
"Evaluating, one moment." ... "Structure is the source of the previously mentioned energy signature of that surpassing nuclear fission. Building materials constructed out of unknown alloy with unprecedented integrity. Only known entrances are marked by the triangular opening on this beach and another sub-bay entrance approximately 150 meters below sea level. Several hundred years old. No life signs detected. Further analysis will require you to gain entrance as the structure's outer shell prevents scanner penetration. Unknown origins. Unknown purpose. Unknown function."
Jeff began walking toward the structure and glanced at the sun.
"Not too long before they get here."
As he neared the green energy barrier, a pedestal in front to the right of the entrance burst open and a purple symbol could be seen in the slot that it revealed. Jeff cautiously approached it and took out his scanner.
"This device appears to be alien in origin and is connected to a nearby forcefield. The technology is far beyond anything encountered before by the federation. Nonetheless, it appears to function like a normal lock requiring only the correct kind of access key."
"Huh... weird... Apparently, uh, aliens built this? But why? How? Where are they now?... are they like humans? Or... or are they like the movies? I guess the most important question would be: Are they hostile?"
Jeff searched around the forcefield and the terminal but found no way to tinker with the electronics or to find any object that matched the symbol inside the terminal.
"Huh... well if there's no one inside and its hundreds of years old, maybe its been abandoned, or better yet, maybe the aliens all died off so we won't have to worry about them. I know I'll be reporting this to the federation when I get back so they can send some research teams out here to find out more about it... If they can even get inside... Unprecedented integrity?"
Jeff decided he had better set up the flares before he got too side-tracked.
Whut? XD
"Alright you're sure you're confident with the landing protocol?"
"Yes sir! It'll be a breeze."
"Alright, I sure hope so Westly."
Quinn turned to Carson, "What's our ETA?"
"About 30 minutes. Cloud cover is a bit dense in the landing area so we might not see the landing sight until we break through the clouds."
"Ok, what about our fuel Jerret?"
"We're still in the safety margin. Fuel preservation is still extremely important though, so when we land, we'll need to shut off the ship for as long as we'll be idle."
"Alright, scanners still can't distinguish any human signatures from the vast ecosystem here, but we have picked up two local distress signals from working life pods which means there are bound to be a few survivors. I just hope none of them are wounded. We don't have very much medical supplies."
~~~
Jeff sat on the beach relaxing up against some flat rocks with his hands behind him supporting his head. In a large patch of sand in front of him, he had lain a circle of flares that were still burning bright. He was relaxing in the heat of the sun with a toothpick he had made out of some plant material in the area hanging out of his mouth. He had just eaten one of the fish he had prepared and was feeling quite relaxed for some one who had been stranded alone on an ocean planet for 4 weeks. Well, he didn't consider himself entirely alone. If it hadn't been for the artificial companionship of Sally, he would have likely lost some of his sanity by now, but the frequent conversations, and the simple sound of another voice helped keep Jeff stable these long days. In fact, Jeff was feeling quite content right about now. The warm sun on his face, a full belly, the soothing sound of the sea on the beach, the occasional alien bird making some strange yet calming squawk, and the comfort of knowing the horrors on this planet would all soon be over. His eyes were closed and a tired smile graced his unshaven face. A distant splash was heard and Jeff opened his eyes and shielded his face from the sun with his hand. Not too far out in the water, a reef-back had breached the surface playfully turning over laying on its back for a moment before diving back under. Jeff smirked and laid back against the rock and closed his eyes again. Then, a more disturbing sound split the tranquility. A long, metallic creek and mechanical whine that thundered through the air. Jeff quickly sat up opening his eyes that instantly fell on the large alien tower. It was moving.
"What the..."
The whole upper part of the structure was extending into the sky becoming taller and taller. Eventually it stopped with a crash. Jeff was standing up now, intently watching the structure.
"Ok... so you can extend to be taller for no reason... cool."
Then, the tower began rotating. Doing a 180 degree turn. Then, the revelation came into Jeff's mind as the tower began angling itself from a pivot point at its base still pointing into the sky.
"Energy levels are spiking inside the alien structure. Power is being rerouted from an energy reserve in the base of the structure into the extended tower section and is increasing to extremely high levels there."
Jeff gasped and spoke under his breath, "Oh, my, gosh..."
"Sally! Is the sunbeam within communications range?!"
"Yes, this PDA's receiver is currently connected to the Sunbeam's systems."
"Patch me in! I've got to tell them to back off!"
"This PDA is not equipped with 2 way communication."
Jeff was about to say 'thanks sally", when he suddenly realize what she had said and he lost his breath for a second.
"Repeat?"
"This PDA is not equipped with 2 way communication."
"What the heck... Since when!?"
"Sally, what OS is this PDA currently running?!"
"This PDA is currently running: Universal Survival Protocol and Assistance (U.S.P.A.) OS version Vanilla 1.0.0 in tandem with AI Assistant program: Reconnaissance Planetary Assistant AI and Informative Relay (Re.P.A.I.R) 1.2.4. If any bugs are found, please have them reported; fore the safety of crash survivors and reliability of survival PDAs are important to the Alterra corporation."
Jeff could barely believe it.
"That version is outdated and was replaced by the 1.2.0 version as a mandatory replacement like 2 years ago for this very reason! How in the hecking heck are the Aurora's PDAs legally running outdated survival softwear!?"
Sally responded, "According to mandates, this OS system is outdated and should have been replaced. However, unable to determine why that protocol was not met by Altera construction and supply crew."
"So I can't contact the Sunbeam myself!?"
"Softwear for that action is not installed."
~~~
"Captain, we'll be breaking atmosphere in 5 minutes. The cloud cover should be dissipating in 4 minutes."
Avery Quinn squinted through the cockpit windshield trying to see through the clouds.
Jerret began speaking, "Captain, I'm detecting a massive metallic structure at our landing sight. Energy levels are extremely high. Did another ship beat us here?"
Quinn was surprised and paused for a moment, "No way, If there were a ship, we'd have picked them up ages ago and received their hailing signal."
"Then what could it be sir? With such high energy levels it would have to be a military class Ion cannon cruiser and the only known terrestrial versions of ion cannons are back on Earth. This is an unexplored planet, there couldn't be a defense cannon. It's gotta be a ship."
"Hmmm... can you get any structural readings?"
"Negative sir, the scanners can't seem to pick it up for some reason even though I know it should be able to especially at this range... All I get is the energy signature. The only thing I can think of that might be causing that would be some kind of military grade jammer."
"This doesn't sound good... Either some unknown federation military outpost is on this planet or some federation ship was doing some secret mission out here on the outer rim and got the distress call first..." Westly said.
"Oh that's just great, so we really DID jettison our cargo for absolutely jack-"
"Cool it Rainer! We can't even see it yet. Could just be a flipping volcano and that's why Jerret can't pick up any structural readings... because there is none."
"Um sir," Jerret informed, "If a volcano had that much thermal energy, it'd have to be erupting more violently than the volcanoes on Io and scans show the weather is perfectly normal... there's no way its a volcano..."
At that moment the clouds gave way and the planet surface was finally visible.
"Hey, our communications system has connected to a personal PDA! Some one's down there to replace its batteries!" Quinn said, "In fact, look! there's some one down there!"
Quinn opened the channel, "Aurora survivor, we have your PDA signature! I don't know how you walked away from that wreck, let alone survived since then, but we'll be happy to bring you onboard and hightail back to federation space. Stand back, we're approaching the landing site now.
"But sir, what about that weird structure to the left of him?" Westly said.
"I don't know but if its federation military they wont fire on us, we've got federation ID codes on this ship. We'll just go down there, pick up the survivor and head out."
"Wouldn't they have at least contacted us by now?" Jerret said.
Quinn looked at him, "That's true... Strange..."
Quinn turned back to the communication com, "Breaking atmosphere in 5... 4... 3...-" Suddenly, the whole cabin lit up in red emergency lights and a red graph appeared on the main console center screen. "What's that?"
Jerret stared at it, "The energy signature is building up... they... they're firing on us!!!"
"What!? Why would they do that?! We've got federation codes! Westly, evasive action, get us out of here full ahead flank!"
"SIR! THEY'RE FIRING!" Jerret screamed.
"GET TO THE LIFE POD!" Rainer yelled.
Everyone in the cabin leaped out of their seats and rushed to the door where a confused and drowsy Derek stood on the other side.
"What's happening guys!?"
They had no chance to respond. No chance to push past him. No chance to even fully comprehend the whole situation. One second they were there, frantically trying to escape, to save themselves. The next, they were gone. All of them. The ship was gone too. Nothing but a ploom of smoke and fire with tiny fragments of hull raining down from the sky.
Jeff couldn't believe what he was witnessing. Completely helpless as a green beam of immense power reduced the Sunbeam to falling debris in an instant. He fell to his knees for the second time on this God forsaken planet. The Sunbeam was gone.
https://forums.unknownworlds.com/discussion/comment/2350672/#Comment_2350672
Palmer's head snapped up from where it had been hanging loosely from his shoulders as the echo of a distant explosion jolted him awake. His slumped body became rigid again and his limp legs steadied themselves against the floor again. He was breathing heavily and blood caked the corner of his mouth and under his nose. A very small pool of dried blood collected on the floor. As he cleared the fog from his mind and began reaching full consciousness, he instantly felt a pang of immense pain in his stomach. The pain was so excruciating that he first thought he had been impaled by something lose in the pod, but upon looking down, he saw that he was fine and realized he was actually extremely hungry. Every few moments, a pulse of pain would ripple from his stomach throughout his abdomen and cause him to cringe.
"I've got to find something to eat... but... I'm all out of nutrient blocks..."
Palmer unlocked the bracer and lifted it over his head and stood up. His legs buckled beneath him, causing him to fall to the floor, and he realized how weak he was. It was at that moment he noticed his pod wasn't sloshing on the waves of an ocean planet.
"What?"
He glanced through the bottom hatch glass and saw dirt. He worked up the strength to grab onto the ladder and hoist himself up through the top hatch. As he stuck his head out he was instantly met with air fresher than anything he thought he'd ever breathe again and it filled him with vigor. Then he looked around. He was on an island filled with alien plant life and various sounds of unknown creatures. It was nearing sunset and he was in a dense patch of forest with strange seemingly blue, bioluminescent trees all around him obstructing his view. The parachutes had tangled themselves in the tops of the trees behind him with twigs and branches sticking through tears in the canvas. At the sight of plants, Palmer hauled himself fully out of the pod and rolled over the side falling hard onto the grassy ground. Wincing away the pain, he crawled up to the nearest plant. It looked like an orange and green melon with palm leaves growing straight up. He unholstered his scanner and rested his head on his arm as he propped the scanner up on the ground aiming at the plant and began scanning. When the scan was complete, he completely ignored the details of the plant and looked down at the survival information.
'Harmless. Possible good source of food.' was all he needed to see before he ripped the plant out of the ground and bit directly into the bulbous melon part. The bite revealed a tender green inside filled with water that reminded him of an unripe watermelon. The taste was similar too, but much more dull and less sweet. None of that mattered to Palmer though, the sight of water and the apparent safe edibility of the planet made it a God send to satiate himself. After fully devouring the plant, he rolled over on his back and rested there for a moment, regaining his strength as the pain from his stomach slowly subsided. He instantly noticed the giant moon that orbited this planet.
"How does that thing not crash into this planet... kinda creepy... but beautiful at the same time."
His energy restored, he slowly began to think about his situation.
"What was that sound that woke me up?... are there any other survivors?... where is this island in relation to the crash site?... Where's the Aurora?... Are there hostile creatures on this island?..."
Palmer sat up and tried to stand. It was difficult, but his energy was slowly returning. He made it back to the pod and climbed back inside. He gathered what materials he could from the pod's locker and came back outside.
"I need to get a better vantage point."
He looked to the sky and noticed a faint ploom of smoke.
"Wouldn't be surprised if that's the Aurora."
He headed off into the trees toward the smoke until he came to a lightly trodden path.
"Huh... what's this doing here..."
Palmer decided to follow the path. Eventually, it lead him out of the dense woods to some high ground where he saw that on either side of him were two small mountains. The strangest part however, was that there were what seemed to be old federation style observatories on both peaks. He decided to take the one to his left since it would take him in the direction of the smoke. Along the way, he scanned various plants discovering their edibility and benefits. The trek was short but very steep, taking every bit of Palmer's already dwindling energy out of him. Once he got to the top, he peeked around the corner of the observatory and saw the Aurora.
"Holy crap... the drive core must have ruptured... meaning... survivors are highly unlikely..."
He came back around the corner and went to the door of the structure. The metal of the observatory was rusted and covered in moss and rain weathering. The door was rusted open allowing Palmer to get a glimpse inside.
"Hello? Is anyone there?"
He stepped inside. The room hall was very small. In a little indention in the wall were two pots containing very large plants that had likely been growing there for years. Palmer recognized them as Chinese potato plants, a common emergency plant seed used in many ship's survival kits.
"There must have been others who crashed on this planet before the Aurora... but how long ago? Are they still alive?"
After gathering several potatoes from the plant for later, he headed down the hall to the observation bubble where there was a desk, a chair, and an overgrown PDA. Palmer tried to scoot the chair to the side to take a seat but, through all the weathering, the chair had become stuck to the floor requiring a bit more effort from Palmer to push it free before he could sit down. He scraped off the moss covering the PDA and picked it up. He wiped the screen down with his elbow and tapped it. Nothing. Then he heard the sound of it rebooting. The screen didn't light up, but the audio was working. He told the PDA to play last recorded voice log. After a few moments of static and pops from the damaged speaker, the audio began playing.
"It won't work, Chief. There's nothing left of the Degasi. No building materials on this island. And my nose tells me the weather's turning. We're gonna have to get our feet wet."
"This island is safe, Marguerit! There are no predators. We can grow food. Why would we abandon it?"
"Your kid says we can't grow enough. Not without more growbeds. Speak up, kid."
A third voice, a young male, began speaking, "It's... it's true. The natural growth rates are too slow to support three of us indefinitely. Especially if the weather gets worse."
Marguerit sighed, "All I'm sayin' is, ocean's got us surrounded. No use hiding."
"I've made my decision. You two want to forfeit your commissions just to take a swim?" The cheif asked.
"Believe me, I'm thinkin' on it."
The voice log ended abruptly. Palmer sat for a moment trying to understand what he had just heard.
"So... These are the ruins of the survivors of the Degasi ship that was lost to the Mongols several years ago... And it sounds like they wanted to go underwater... maybe that means they're still alive!... I hope... I don't want to be the only one on this planet for God knows how long..."
Palmer got up and went outside gazing at the Aurora again and the surrounding area as the sun began to set. He couldn't be sure, but he could have sworn he saw a large, skinny red tail splash up above the water before it slipped back under the surface just behind the Aurora's engines. Palmer then decided he had better get back to his life pod and start a fire before it got too cold in this fast approaching darkness.
Jeff couldn't quite tell how he felt. His mind was swirling with negative thoughts and emotions. Depression, anger, grief, confusion. He steadily became more and more depressed and grief stricken. Every time he tried to focus on one particular thought, his mind took him down a dark path that ended with a sinister option: suicide. He tried to find the silver lining, tried to think of something that would bring him out of this deep dark hole that was paralyzing both his body and his mind. He was thinking to himself, fighting himself, trying to escape from his own mind.
"This is a dream..."
"No, you know full well this isn't a dream."
"There is no hope."
"No! There must be hope, something I'm not thinking of."
"There's nothing to be done, no one to rescue you, no one to comfort you."
"No! I'm never alone! God is with me."
"There is no God, what foolishness is this? Take out your knife and end it all now."
"No! I can't! I won't!"
"What good is it to struggle? No hope, no help, no choice. End it now."
"NO! Ther- There IS a choice! There is hope! I-I'm... Yes, alive! I'm not dead yet! I can still fight to stay alive! I can get of this planet some how! I can pray! I can press on! Suicide is never a valid answer!"
"But-"
"No, there is no but! I'm going to climb out of this hole! I'm going to survive! And I'm going to find out why this- this gun shot down the Sunbeam! I'm going to destroy it and get off this planet and there's nothing that can stop me!"
And with a splitting scream, Jeff pounded his fist into the sand as his rage pulled him out of the hole of insanity. He stayed there, breathing hard, staring at the sand as the sky continued to darken as the sun set.
"God, give me strength... I- I can't deal with this alone..." he muttered.
Jeff stood up and tried to calm himself.
"I need to get back to the pod and gather more materials... If- If I'm going to be here for a lot longer, then I'm going to need a home more suitable then an 8x10 floating metal prison."
Jeff bent over and retrieved his PDA from the sand and wiped it off.
"Sally, bring up a document file."
A text box and a keyboard appeared on screen. Jeff began writing goals for himself, something to keep him motivated and to keep him focused.
1.SURVIVE!
2.Find out more about the alien structure and figure out a way to disable it.
3.Build a ship and get off this stupid planet.
4.Build a better home.
5.Get a Cyclo-
Jeff was still typing when a notification popped onto the screen and Sally began verbalizing, "Picking up a distress signal from life pod 37."
Wow, look at the size of that Bumpasaurus! It's gigantic!
I can relate. One day, I restart reading Aurora Falls, and when I finish, not only do I realize I read Borealis Rising, I also realize it's two days later.
Happens to the best of us.
Jeff had been sleepily heading back to his pod. He remembered that not too many hours ago he had washed his hands of that claustrophobic tin-can and yet now, he was forced to return to its safety. His eyes were barely open with his head propped up by his arm against the armrest of the seamoth. The sun had fully set now and the night had settled in.
"I'll check out that distress signal tomorrow. Hopefully it'll have some useful salvage."
Jeff reached the pod and climbed his way inside where he collapsed on the uncomfortable floor.
"This will be the last time I sleep here."
And with that thought, he shut his eyes.
In the morning, Jeff sat up from the floor and rubbed various points on his back where his bones had pressed hard against the metal floor. He had already been awake for an hour, unable to stay asleep for long in the tossing of the pod on the waves. He got up and began transferring all of his things out of the pod and into the seamoth's storage. He had enough materials to begin building his own more spacious base but he needed a hand-held constructor first. To make a constructor, he would need a computer chip and a battery. He had several unused batteries, but no computer chip. Jeff hoped the life pod he would be visiting soon would have a computer chip or salvage materials to craft one. After cramming all the materials and equipment he could into the seamoth, he then took a dive-reel he had crafted a while back to tie the mobile vehicle fabrication platform to it. Once he was all set, Jeff finished off a water bottle while sitting on the top of the pod and hopped into the water. He climbed up and into the seamoth and set off toward the distress beacon. Jeff made a mental note that the pod was sending a continuous signal meaning it was still operational. Survivors however would be quite slim. The beacon was coming from an area dangerously close to the radius of the radiation leak and there was still another day or so before the Aurora's particle field would fully clear the radiation. The signal was quite a distance and would take him into the open ocean area that Jeff now referred to as the grassy plateaus due to the red grass coverage and the strange vertical, segmented pillars that rose from the flat terrain. Though he had only found reefbacks to be native to this biome so far, he still wondered what other creatures might wonder their way into it for a reefback snack... or worse, a human snack. As he came out of a branch of kelp forest into the grassy plateau, he kept his eyes open for reefbacks. If he hung around them, anything big enough to eat one might go for one of them instead of him. There were several pods of reefbacks around this area today and their presence was reassuring for Jeff. While he was traveling, Jeff had been thinking about his goals and various other projects to work toward. One of which would be tricking out his seamoth. The way it is now, the seamoth is a very fast and agile little sub with a small storage bay and a decent power supply. However, the minimal depth capability and the lack of defense mechanisms left Jeff feeling that modifications would be the best next goal after he began the construction of a more permanent home.
"Sally, bring up the base construction menu."
A holo screen appeared to his right with a listing of all known structures. He noticed that what he was looking for was not listed.
"Sally, what structure is required to make modifications to this seamoth submersible?"
"That would be the MoonPool Submersible Bay. This structure's schematics are not currently known."
"Hmmf, figures... I'll probably be forced to go back into the Aurora to look for the schematics database."
By this point the grassy plateau started to give way to much deeper and darker ocean.
"Oh boy, here we go."
Jeff brought the seamoth down with the terrain as it sloped deeper and deeper until the sand gave way to coral-covered rock and dropped off abruptly into the darkness. Through the murkiness, he could make out some faint light coming from the darkness. Jeff continued to descend.
"Warning, reaching safe depth margin. Further decent will result in hull failure."
Jeff instantly shot his eyes up to the top of the seamoth's pilot bubble where a depth counter was displayed and he realized he had almost forgotten about it.
"Maybe it's a good thing I can't go deeper yet..."
Jeff looked for the distress signal's waypoint on his hud but suddenly realized it wasn't there. He looked around and found it again. It was coming from ahead of him on the surface.
"Huh, woulda thought it would have sank into the depths... Maybe the pod's more intact that I thought."
Jeff started heading forward out into the darkness and slowly ascended up toward the surface. After a few minutes of closing the distance to the waypoint, he suddenly noticed light coming out of the darkness above him in strange splotches unlike that of the sun shining through the surface. He slowly got closer until a sharp spike of rock appeared in front of him out of the murk. The stalactite of stone was covered in various table coral and other growth.
"What? How is this just floating here?"
He maneuvered around it and got closer to the strange light and suddenly stopped in his tracks when he realized he was only twenty yards from a giant, pulsating, pink blob attached to the underside of a stone structure. Jeff looked around and noticed there were more of those pink blobs dispersed between a forest of those stalactites. He followed the underside of the structure until he found an opening big enough to fit a cyclops right in the center of it. Jeff broke through the surface and was amazed at what he saw. A forest. He had surfaced in a pond in the middle of what seemed to be an island. Cliffs of stone rose up around him the tops of which were covered in plant growth of all kinds. To his right was a ledge of sand that lead into a cave. Jeff could barely believe it. It was all so beautiful, yet so impossible. The plant life on the other mountain island was so sparse and plain. How is solid rock floating like this? Jeff had to know. He resubmerged in the seamoth and went up to the closest globular mass of pink. Getting out of the seamoth immediately reminded him of the first upgrade he wanted to add to the seamoth: built in scanner. He swam up to the mass and began scanning it with the hand-held. The percentage counter went up slowly and every second Jeff floated there in dark open ocean gave him a very dreadfully nervous feeling. This place was even deeper than the grassy plateaus or the area round the mountain island. He tried not to look down but he knew he had to keep an eye out for danger. Finally, the scan was complete and he quickly hopped back inside the safety of the seamoth. Sally then began verbalizing the gathered data.
"Structural analysis reveals that this entity is made up of two separate species. The pink main body and inner jaws are the dominant creature. The outer, gel-like substance is a mesh of microorganisms capable of forming a sealed vacuum around the creature's jaws. A thin layer of helium is stored within the outer membrane, providing buoyancy.
Assessment: Further research required"
"Huh... interesting... So this whole island isn't connected to the ground but rather held in place by these little buggers."
Jeff resurfaced, parked the seamoth up next to the sandy ledge, and disembarked. Standing on solid ground was always a great feeling for Jeff even if the ground was only twenty feet thick and unknown depths of ocean lie directly below him. He breathed in a deep refreshing breath and looked at the sky above. There were bird calls similar to what he had heard on the mountain island which reminded him of the alien nature of this island and warned him to proceed with caution. Then he saw the smoke. It wasn't coming from the direction of the Aurora, it was coming from some where on the island, and Jeff had a pretty good idea of where.
The night had been cold as Palmer had expected. His survival PDA indicated the temperature was around 13 degrees Celsius. Not too cold, but uncomfortable enough to warrant a fire. During the night, he had foraged around in the "woods" for materials and fuel for a fire. In his search, he had found the ruins of a 3rd base built by the Degasi survivors. It was quite destroyed and half of it was covered in a land-slide. Inisde, however, he found several useful materials such as some old silicon rubber and some silver. For titanium, Palmer simply took out his welder and removed small sections of the old structure. It was very inefficient in terms of cutting compared to the laser cutter, but he was able to accumulate a fair amount of titanium that would suit his needs. Back at the pod, the fabricator broke each material down into its basic elements and reconstituted them into a survival knife. Using the knife, he inspected the trees in the area and discovered that the tall bioluminescent trees were very similar to the wooded trees of Earth but more along the lines of very thick and dense plant stalks. This would have posed a problem considering the amount of water contained in plant stalks, however, the liquid inside these trees was actually quite flammable, even more so than tree sap back home. The liquidy sap was blue and produced its own light which indicated that the sap was the origin of the trees' bioluminescence. Whatever materials constituted these trees, Palmer didn't really care as long as it burned well. After building a fire near the life pod, he made a bed of leaves to sleep on. He ate another marble melon and fell asleep. In the morning, Palmer felt better than he thought he ever would again. He felt that he had some strength behind his muscles now and was more confident in his survival chances. During the night, he had received a distress signal from life pod 5, 6, and 27. Only one of those signals continually pinged indicating the rest were either destroyed or damaged. Additionally, the PDA's AI had indicated to Palmer that the area on the outskirts of the island surrounding the Aurora were heavily irradiated but that strangely, the radiation levels were slowly decreasing which meant, some how, the particle containment field was still online.
"That's a plus. Won't have to worry about getting radiation poisoning in a few days."
Palmer struggled to put out the fire. The sap was like oil and he made a note to himself to be very careful next time he made a fire. Once the fire was finally smothered, Palmer set out in search of more useful materials. He made another stop at the abandoned base for more deconstruction for titanium and other various metals like copper and gold. There were a few lab materials in the base as well. Samples of what seemed to be some of the underwater life on this planet. One looked liked a punctured mushroom, and the other resembled shelf coral or giant lichen. On his way back, he gathered plant materials as the AI had indicated they posed a good source of fibers. He then fabricated a flashlight and a reinforced dive suit using the synthetic fibers made from the plant materials. The suit would defend him against the crab creatures he had encountered a few times on this island and, if he ever dared to do so, would help him breathe at greater depths in the water. Palmer was starting to realize that this island's resources were very few. Food and water was about the only thing that this island provided naturally, the rest was gathered by the Degasi survivors from underwater. He knew it would only be a matter of time before he would have to take a dive to find some resources. He wanted to be fully prepared for whatever this alien ocean had to throw at him. He had already seen evidence of massive creatures when he saw that large red and white tail and he didn't what to find out the hard way if they were aggressive or docile. He would need some kind of vehicle and the seamoth was the only one he thought he could remotely obtain the materials for at this stage. He hoped that he would be able to find those materials in the 3 degasi bases, otherwise, he'd still have to take a swim on his own. Palmer was walking up a path. He had already completely dismantled and looted the main Degasi ruin and was now heading off to deconstruct the two observation pods at the tops of the two mountains. He was at the fork in the road about to choose which one to go for first when he heard a large splash. A splash much different from that of lapping sea water, and it didn't come from the shore, it came from the center of the island. Palmer decided to investigate further and left the path into the dense plant life.
~~~
Jeff was about to head into the cave to try and find a way to reach the surface when he heard some stirring in the trees above him. He looked up and his eyes widened.
~~~
After only a short distance of hacking through large leaves and dodging trees, Palmer came to a cliff edge. Down below was a pond and in the center of it was a seamoth. Confused, Palmer looked around the edges of the pond. There, on a sandy ledge, stood his dearest friend, Jeffery Masterson, and he was looking right at him.
Now's the time when things get interesting.
"You're alive?!" they both said semi-simultaneously.
"Are you ok?!" Palmer called.
"Yeah I'm, pretty ok, much better now seeing you alive! You?"
"Things are going pretty well for me actually!"
"What, did your pod land on this island?"
"Yeah, and it was a miracle too, because I was about to starve to death and there are several types of edible plants here! Uh, By the way, How did you get a seamoth in a pond in the middle of this island?"
"This island isn't your typical island! It's actually floating completely separate from the sea floor! I can tell you more later! Wait right there, I'm coming up!"
Jeff dashed off into the cave. The cave was very straight with a somewhat consistent size all the way through. It slowly sloped upwards until he came out in the middle of the forest. Palmer made his way to him and they clasped arms.
"I never thought I'd see you again," Jeff said.
"I wasn't to hopeful either Jay, but looks like it turned out well in the end! How many others made it?"
Jeff's face instantly lost its smile and his eyes averted to the ground.
He sighed, "When the Aurora initially landed, there were several life pods online with survivors." He took in a breath and looked up, "The Aurora's quantum reactor went supercritical and exploded which not only disintegrated the entire front 4th of the ship, but output extremely high amounts of radiation in a kilometer radius. Anyone who may have survived on the Aurora itself, was killed by the blast. Anyone within the radiation area are long gone. I've been finding capsized pods in several locations and if no one died of malnourishment or the aggressive fauna around here, the radiation eventually got them. There's a 99% chance you and I are the only ones left..."
Palmer's face became sober too, "Wow... I honestly didn't think it'd be that bad... I didn't think anything could be as bad as the situation I'd been in..."
"Yeah, what's you're story? You're pod's signal is still coming in meaning its intact. How come I didn't get the signal much sooner?"
"I was stuck up in space until yesterday. When I jettisoned from he Aurora, I launched from the side opposite the planet. There were several explosions at the same time too. The debris battered my pod until several primary systems failed. I was stuck up there with nothing but a flickering oxygen display and life support."
Palmer continued relaying the story of how he'd salvaged wreckage in space and guided the pod toward the planet, barely harvesting oxygen in time.
"Wow, and I thought MY situation was bad..."
"Hey, lets walk up this way, I've got some materials to gather while we talk."
Palmer and Jeff began walking back up to the path Palmer had originally been on. Meanwhile, Jeff told his story of dealing with the pod fire, his discoveries of the world below the surface, and the tragedy of the Sunbeam. By this point, they had walked all the way up to the abandoned observation pod that faced the Aurora and Palmer had begun dismantling it.
"You mean some alien gun shot down the Sunbeam?!"
"Yeah, and the power I saw it unleash makes me think that IT is what brought down the Aurora too!" Jeff said sitting on a cliff edge looking out toward the Aurora.
"Heck... this whole situation is just getting crazier and crazier. First the Aurora goes down, then we're the only 2 surviving souls out of the whole bloody crew, and now it looks like there's malintent behind this whole thing!"
"This is the unfortunate course of events that we have been thrust into I'm afraid."
"So, what's our plan?"
"Well the first goal I think we need to strive for is building an appropriate base. After you and I have been stuck inside a claustrophobic tin-can for this long, I think you'll agree that a more suitable home is in order. The fact that this island exists is even more of a blessing too! We can build a base here and not even have to worry about stalkers or those serpentine shark things... still have no idea what to call them."
"How about Reaper? By your description earlier, sounds like death incarnate."
"Basically."
"On your note of building on this island. I've explored the majority of this place and as you can see, there are ruins of previous survivors from many years ago, the Degasi. I've been reading some of their logs and apparently, this planet has a really harsh hurricane season. They thought like we did: set up shop on the island and won't have to worry about the dangers of the ocean. We'll have food and life'll be good. Well, when hurricane season hit, they were forced under. Anything we built on this island might be great for a while, but would be a complete waste later on and the Degasi didn't leave any kind of calendar so we have no idea when it might hit."
"Really? That ruins that idea... Well, we can at least harvest the usable plantlife here and try and sustain it in a base. Our first step toward that goal, however, needs to be getting you a seamoth. The waters around this island are very deep and easy territory for any, uh, 'reaper' who wants to waltz in for a snack. I brought my mobile vehicle bay with me so we just need to get the materials and I'll fab one up for ya."
"Sounds good. I've been dismantling these bases with a welder to get the materials I need for just that reason."
"Dang, must be slow going without a laser cutter."
"Yeah it is, you don't happen to have one do ya?"
"Nope, but I can help you with my own welder."
"Great, now give me a hand with this."
After nothing but tragedy after tragedy, things were starting to look up for Jeff now that he had the real human companionship of his friend Palmer. Jeff wondered in the back of his mind, 'for how long it would last?'. However, he quickly dismissed that thought.
@ThunderShock27, is this a fan story about your secret desire for multiplayer?!
You diabolical fiend you...
@Skope , While i will never deny that I would have loved multiplayer in this game, this story is in NO WAY related to the desire for it to exist and isn't connected to any of my other threads. The origin of the idea of Palmer surviving and helping Jeff was a pure spur-of-the-moment decision that was entirely influenced by Jamezorg's quote here:
This whole story is being written as I go, not pre'fabricated' (haha puns), using the game's lore as the main timeline. I thought it would be a great idea because, while strictly following the subnautica lore right on the dot might still make for a good story, the introduction of unexpected factors that DON'T happen in the real game add to the excitement, drama, and intrigue of the story. Introducing Palmer as an unexpected catalyst in the story makes way for much more interesting possibilities for the reader to contemplate. Will Palmer make it to the planet? Will Jeff ever find him? Will Palmer survive the landing? Will Palmer survive in these harsh waters? Will they both make it off the planet together? These are few of many possibilities that introducing Palmer as a factor presents. Because Jeff is based entirely off of the character you play as in the game and since I'm following the events of the actual game's lore, everyone kinda has an idea of what is going to happen to him. Ah, but NO ONE knows what will happen to Palmer since he is an entirely unique character to the story. This is how I begin to play with your mind... in an exciting, adrenaline filled way of course.
Your comments can, in some very subtle ways, influence the story, friends.