User blog:Deltakatknight/Subnautica with Dusty

Disclaimer: I do not own anything in this story except for the characters Dusty, Ryan, and the few creatures of my own that will appear, the actual player is a different person. This story is purely for entertainment purposes and for me to practice as a writer, this is by no means the actual storyline for Subnautica. Events that happen in my story may not actually happen in the game, and vice verisa. All dialogue from the PDA and such is taken from this here glorious wiki. (Visit PDA page for futhur details and such) Bottom line, I don't own the Subnautica in this story, it's just something fun I've decided to do, and without futher ado, on with the story! :3 (I make typos, if you see any, just give me a shout in the comments and I'll fix it!) -Deltakatknight

DAY ONE:

The sound of blaring alarms sounded in his ears as he was quickly shoved along in a sea of bodies. The whole ship, the vassal known as Aurora, was crashing. "Please! My brother! Has someone seen him?! RYAN ANSWER ME!" A red headed man was pushed as members of the crew of the once glorious ship were fleeing for their lives. His shouting continued, but it barely made a scratch in the noise already present. In the wave of people his brother Ryan was nowhere to be seen, and by the second the tremors were getting worse. "I'm sorry brother." Finally he turned and booked it for the nearest life pod, he knew Ryan would want him to be safe, as the slightly older brother (by five and a half minutes) he always put Dusty first. Now would be no different. As he ran by he could just make out it's number as he flashed by. Life pod 5. Dusty quickly took a seat, chanting to himself not to panic as he pulled the bar over his head and securely over his chest. The world around him shook and rattled. A lurching swoop came into his stomach and in mere seconds he hit what sounded like water. The panel on the life pod's message player, or communication relay, flew off and hit him right in the face. Dusty felt splitting pain, before being hurled into spinning darkness.

Three hours passed.

He woke up to the smell of something burning, at first he opened his mouth to bark at his brother to turn down the furnace, before there was more pain and he realized HE was actually burning.

"HOLY-" he leaped up, smoke fluttering in his face as it clogged his face and lungs. He grabbed the fire extinguisher, hastily blowing out the small fire that was crackling near the communication relay. Dusty coughed loudly, waving his hand rapidly as the redhead tried desperately to fan the smoke out of the pod. When he was sure the fire was only a small pile of ashes, he collapsed back. The pod rocked below him, small splashes coming from outside. Had he landed in a lake? Dusty couldn't move, and his face burned. It was than he realized the panel that hit him was edged with blood, his blood. The pod didn't have mirrors, or anything reflective, so slowly with his fingers he gently touched along the wound that was on his face.

It was quiet spare the small grunts of pain, and the sounds of the water outside. Finally he got the idea that the wound was from his left temple, down across his eye, and stopped just a bit before his right eye. It was a miracle it hadn't damaged his eyeball, but it stung like the fire had and the smoke wasn't doing him any favours. Finally he got his act together, remembering his training he had gone through back on Earth. Yup. The metal hunk clogged with smoke (kinda like the life pod) was his birth planet, his and... "Ryan..." Was his brother safe? Was he hurt? Was he scared? Dead...? He shook his head. No, his brother was tough, he was out there, too. Alive, somewhere. He hauled himself to his feet, carefully making his way to the emergency supplies the pod cared, trying not to fall as the ship gently swayed. Dusty patched himself up with a medical kid he found inside, there was a medic kit generator on the wall, but it was broken. Something he wasn't going to worry about now, he could fix it later. He sighed in relief as the ointments sank into the wound, numbing it out. It had already started to heal, it was amazing how good modern medicine worked, but even it couldn't save him from the scarring sure to follow. He laid back. There was also food and filtered water, some of which he drank, even someone who paid so little attention in class knew that water was substantial (duh) and that rationing was the last thing he wanted to do. If he was right and he was in a lake, he'd have lots of water.

The food however, he saved. He wasn't hungry anyways, and if he ate anything he had a feeling it would just be thrown right back up, his stomach still unsettled from all the tumbling and turning and tossing he had endured. Dusty dug around a bit, along with a computer chip, and a dive suit (which no way in NOVA was he putting on) he found his PDA. Somehow it had survived, and wasn't crushed. Not even scratched! "Pfft this is great, last one I had it slipped literally four inches of the ground and shattered." He turned it on, greeted by a voice.

"Detecting increased local radiation levels. Trend is consistent with ongoing degradation of the Aurora's dark matter drive core, due to damage sustained during collision. Continuing to monitor." "Wait.... Siri?!"

Dusty did some more digging, his findings being a whole lot of nothing and a small water proof camera. "...... welp." He set it up. He never considered himself a technology genius, no, that was his workaholic brother, but he managed. Finally he looked into the camera, and just put on a face. "This is Dusty Novak, crew members of the Aurora, doing a gravitational slingshot thing around Planet 4546B ...yeah the tin can crashed. Readings say it's from a projectile 'energy pulse' of unknown origins resulting in catastrophic hull damage. Basically what happens when you mix potassium pelts with water.....It's kaput." He started speaking to the camera, getting a real vibe from that ancient movie he watched with Ryan on the way here, what was it called? Martian? Yeah that one.

"So I don't go crazier, I'm going to log everything I do, heck with my brilliance become a movie of its own!" He grinned widely before taking the camera in hand and strapping it to his chest with a harness it came with, it would be like a first person view. "Wow bet this would make a good video game," he commented, finally getting the guts to climb up the latter to the escape hatch. "Time to find out, what's outside." The metal bars felt clammy under his slightly sweat palms as he heaved himself outside.

He could only stare. Only stare at what his eyes were greeted with. "Okay.... NOT a lake, it's a freaken ocean!!!" He cried, staring at water, and water, more water all going as far as his eyes could see. Finally he turned around, noticing the wreckage that was once the Aurora. "Dam.... gonna need a bigger boat to clean up this mess, who am I kidding nobodies gonna clean this up." He waved his arms, until that rocked the boat and almost threw him in. The water around was clear, very clear, in fact here he could see to the bottom. It was far cleaner than any water he'd ever seen on earth.

"W-woah." But right away, he knew such was not drinkable, the smell of salt was all he could smell besides the smoke and the (shutter) fishy smell. Despite such, he still took a bit of the water on the tips of his fingers and tasted it, spitting it right out only a second later, gagging. "UAH! Yup, definitely salt water, ugh." He did a quick spin around to show off the water, water, even more water, and the beached smoking Aurora, before retreating back inside. "So I can't leave, unless I wanna swim... I don't think going to the Aurora would be a good idea, if any that will be death in a can, in a big, big can.... hopefully the guys watching the ship up at Colonial Headquarter have figured out what's happened...they'll fix this and come get us out of this... well can't call it a swamp exactly." He flopped down in the chair, this time feeling satisfaction from rocking the life pod. He pulled out the PDA again, keeping the camera rolling. "This thing... gotta have games, anything." He muttered, before blinking. "Readme?" He clicked it, before giving a disgruntled face. "Ugh. Reading"

Congratulations: the hard part is over. (YEAH RIGHT! I almost threw the PDA across the pod here) Your PDA has automatically rebooted in Emergency Mode. This operating system has one purpose: to keep you alive. (Yeah I kind of like living) If that is not possible it will alert salvage teams to the location of your remains. (Tremendously comforting) It features: Follow its directions and we will bring you home alive. (And if I don't...? Ooookay forget I asked) NB Your personal and work files have been encrypted and may be retrieved at a later date by a licensed engineer. (.....ugh)
 * If you are reading this, then you have survived an emergency evacuation of a capital-class ship equipped with Alterra technology.
 * Full monitoring of vital signs for timely survival advice
 * Blueprints for fabricating a range of essential survival equipment
 * Onboard camera, microphone and OCR technology for short-range situational analysis (found it, I like it so far)
 * Cross-compatibility with all Alterra-compliant products (nice! More tin cans!)

He clicked the 'survival checklist'. He hated lists, but he was in a bit of a more 'follow the rules' mood than usual.

1. Administer first aid if required (already done! Aren't I smart?) 2. Survey the environment for threats and resources (HAHAH No way buddy not going out there) 3. Take inventory of available materials and supplies, and decide on rations (gotta do this) 4. Construct necessary survival equipment using the lifepod's fabricator (don't have stuff Sherlock!!) 5. Check lifepod for damage, and repair as necessary (surprisingly none, except for the part that NAILED ME IN MY FACE!!!) 6. Broadcast local distress signal using lifepod's short-range communications relay (again, it killed itself on my face) 7. Locate other survivors (....is there anyone?) 8. Find or construct a more permanent habitat (I'm not leaving) 9. Maintain physical and psychological health until rescue (physical Heath? Check! Psychological Heath? Oh boy... wonder if the fabricator can make my medication) NB This information is meant as a general guide. In the first instance you should always follow the advice of your PDA, which has taken your particular circumstances into account. He set the PDA down, having enough of it. It was starting to make his head hurt, the wound across his eye did not help. Dusty laid down, tired. It was getting dark, so for all he could guess, it was growing close to nighttime. He held the camera up.

"This is Sol number one...... don't know what time on Earth would be..... ugh who cares anyway. I'll leave the camera on tonight... since I think I'm gonna die.... tomorrow I'm going to try to fix the communication relay problem, and just wait for someone.... I guess. I'm not leaving, I have no idea what's outside... guess I'm just going to try to sleep, it's been 24 hours now since I took my medication for ADHD, so if I sleep.. I'll be surprised." He set the camera down, turning the lights off (even if it was scary it was better to save power anyways.) Dusty curled up as best as he could, and surprisingly, he didn't stay up as late as he'd expect, drifting off, surviving a deadly crash really drained someone.

DAY TWO:

"Caution. Continued degradation of the Aurora's drive core may cause a quantum detonation. If the drive core is breached, probability of death by exposure to radioactive crash site materials increases to 37%."

That was Dusty's lovely awaking from the PDA (which he almost threw across the pod from a heart attack moment) The redhead opened his eyes, sore and stiff from his night on the cold floor, but he was still somehow alive; miraculously. "Detonation? Radioactive crash site..?" He mumbled, flinching slightly as his finger tips brushed the new scar across his face. "Yeah I'm totally saying an alien did this, how embarrassing it be for people to know a communication relay beat me up." He said as he let his finger tips linger for a moment. Speaking of which, such still needed to be repaired. He grabbed the camera, and approached what was left of the tech, which was still sparking and giving off small spews of dark smoke.

"Warning. To maximize your chance of rescue you should repair the radio onboard your lifepod."

"No shiitake." Dusty grumbled, deciding before anything he had to eat; fishing the nutrient block from the storage. It did not look appetizing, but Dusty tore at a small piece, forced it into his mouth and began chewing. It took what felt like several minutes of chewing before he attempted swallowing the dense 'food'. "Tastes like mud...." he commented grimly as the food when down, he held it up for the camera to see it, (the awful food) and continued. It sat like a ball of uncomfortableness in his stomach, (he wished he had some warm food, as it was the best kind of food) but he was full and he returned to his main task on hand. Dusty coughed as more smoke came up, making his eyes burn. "Oh that's awful, it's like standing next to a smoker." It took more smoke (might of hacked out a lung here) a small cut from the wires, and being shocked twice (ouch) for it finally clicked that Dusty wasn't able to repair it manually like his brother Ryan could. "Okay after painful defeat, it's pretty clear that I'm going to need a repair tool." The redhead informed his nonexistent audience. Breathing slightly heavily he shuffled over to the fabricator, stumbling just the slightest on the rocking pod. He only had a basic knowledge of how to use it, he was a demolition expert not a .....builder or whatever they were called. When the redhead approached it, the technology unfolded and a solid hologram of the options came up. After a few minutes of staring with a bewildered expression and perplexity, Dusty found he could do literally nothing. The thing needed magnesium, titanium and ....crashfish powder? What? "Welp, I can't do squat. I have nothing." He said hopelessly. Instead of sulking, he climbed back outside and sat staring at the remains of the Aurora. It was pretty quiet (thus it received hate as he could barely stand it). Something leaped out of the water once or twice, it looked like a fish. Suddenly, when he least expected it the silence was broken.

"Warning. Local radiation readings suggest a quantum detonation will occur with a probability of 85.5%. Advise observing a 10km safety range."

"AH MY GOSH!" He screeched, almost falling into the water. "Siri! Your going to give me a heart attack!" But he had heard the words "quantum" and "detonation" in the same sentence, and that was like saying "Ryan" and "late" in the same sentence, it was just not a good thing. He cast a nervous gaze over to the broken slightly smoking ship.... 85.5%? Wasn't there still a 15.5% chance of it NOT exploding in a big ball of fiery doom? Even he, as bad at math as he was, knew it was a low percentage in chance wise. He might as well be jumping into the water now without the divers suit on. He looked at the water below him, trying to think of a number that would sum up his chances of survival and finding his brother. "Very very low," he said in a voice lower than a whisper. He waited outside for a bit, scanning the skies for spacecrafts, scanning the water for anything or anyone (all he saw was water, surprising right?) Once he did see this huge green grey (or was it blue? The glare on the water made it hard to tell) creature, he'd noticed it's tail first, which was dotted with glowing greenish yellow pods. At first it didn't bother him, he was actually curious, until the thing 'laughed' with a hyena like laughter like noise and scared the bejesus out of him. After that he made a quick and 'brave' hasty retreat into the pod. He preferred the silence over that scary noise any day of the week (if this place followed normal time shindiggery) Dusty wished he had a rock to throw at it, but all he had was the annoying PDA, which kept yapping about detecting dehydration and stuff like that. And while he gladly chuck it at whatever the heck that thing was, Dusty begrudgingly admitted he needed the thing. "Emergency: Seismic readings suggest a quantum detonation has occurred in the Aurora's drive core."

Dusty jolted upwards, looking around in every direction in fear before scrambling out of the pod and back onto the roof to face the Aurora.

The reactor will reach a super critical state in T- 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, (static) 4, (glitchy almost inaudible) 3, (half of the word said before being cut off by the explosion) 2, 1-"

BOOM!

Dusty flinched against the explosion and the deafening noise, feeling it push the life pod back with its force. In instinct he held his arms above his head as water and metal chunks of the ship when flying. Huge grey clouds erupted from the ship, orange and red lights flashed as the combustions only continued. Green light flickered like a glitch, and he slammed his eyes shut as if hoping that if he couldn't see the danger, it would just disappear. Finally the noise died down, and the explosions stopped. Dusty only realized he was pressing his forehead to the surface of the pod when he opened his eyes. He didn't notice the tears until he felt the warmth of them. If anyone happened to be in the ship or near it.... well they were dead now. Finally he forced his amber orange eyes to look up at the remains of Aurora. It looked like a corpse that had been picked at several times, there was mostly only a frame left, and the parts had been scattered.

It was only than he noticed one of the pieces that had been launched high into the air was coming back down, near him. "ACK!" He ducked, dropping down into the pod as quickly as possible as it hit the pod, the horrible sound of scratching metal together filled his already ringing ears. He fell as the pod shook, hitting his side and knocking his breath out. Dusty laid there for several long minutes, in shock. The string of bad luck was unbelievable, not that he was very lucky in the first place. Finally he decided to look at the camera, (basically all he had left) it surprisingly wasn't broken the slightest. ".....wow." Was all he could manage to say. Finally he was able to urge himself to move, to get up and take care of himself.

Even than, he was too stubborn to admit he was rather afraid (scratch that he was ready to have one of his brother's anxiety attacks) right now, how the water supply he had left was running low. (To add to the bad luck and trauma) He was hesitant to take another sip from the bottle, but he was so thirty. It almost felt like someone had shoved a fist full of dry sand down his throat. Finally It was at the end of the day, when the darkness creeped into the pod and swallowed up every last bit of the light. His supplies completely ran out. His supplies had ran out, the Aurora was done for, he was completely alone.... Was he going to die here? The thought alone terrified him. There was no sleep that night, he felt too sick anyways, and was afraid of the noises that came from outside. Sol number two, completely hopeless and hanging by a thread.

DAY THREE: Turned the camera off. Sulked. A lot. Slept a little. Ran out of water and food. Finally considered the idea of having to go outside. Sol number three, going to die if I don't leave.

DAY FOUR:

"Survey the environment for threats and resources, HAHAH No way buddy not going out there!" Dusty relayed the recording, before with a grin from ear to ear announced; "hey guess what? I'm going out there!" Now all of this, just for the record, he didn't like this at all. Far from it. He didn't like the suit ether, it was uncomfortably tight and he felt it cleaving. After a few moments that whole moulding to its wearer's body shape worked and it was a bit more bearable. "Okay, helmet is gonna wreak my hair more than it already is but live or die, liveeee or dieeee!" He shoved it on, blinking as a weird dial, pretty sure it was called the HDU, appeared in the lower left hand side of the glass panel. "Oooo I am not doing to well," he cringed. Finally he added the camera to his helmet and climbed outside with the flippers tucked under his arm. (Some show that'd be watching him try climbing a ladder with flippers on)

Dusty felt feelings of paranoia rise up in his stomach as he saw the swirling ocean. Dusty really did not like water, a childhood experience. As a kid, like most children he'd been signed up for spots, well he'd rather do baseball, or maybe basketball, he and Ryan had been signed up for swimming. He could swim, rather well in fact, but even if he became the fastest in his class his father never praised him. Dusty clenched his teeth thinking about how his father used to say things like he swam like he had a pole up his butt, or that he if he wasn't always too busy fussing over hair he'd actually be able to do something right. Dusty gave up caring what his father had to say about him, and slowly his father stopped paying attention to him all together, spare the occasional times where he had been used as someone to blame when things went wrong, or beat him when his temper got out of control, that seemed harsh and hard, but he had the easy bit of it. Ryan, on the other hand, was tortured by their father's expectations and punishments. It was four months ago when he hit Ryan that Dusty snapped. He packed suitcases for the two, and left. In fact, they'd left earth all together, as Ryan easily qualified to board the Aurora as a engineer, and Dusty a demolitions expert. Aurora had been like a saving grace. They thought they were finally safe from the abusive past, and than this happened. Dusty blinked when he noticed he was standing there for who knows how long, tearinglup. He began laughing. "Hey this helmet is defective! W-water already got in!" He joked, trying to make himself feel better. He didn't say much else till he pulled his slippers over his feet. Remembering his PDA's device, he looked around in the crystal clear waters for anything remotely dangerous looking. Spare some really weird looking small fish, nothing seemed too horrific. His mind flashed back to the weird creature that had made that laughing noise.

"First thing on my to-do list is to get a knife, nothing like the explosives, but even if I had any doubt they would work well underwater." Dusty sighed, he stared at the water for a bit longer, before his eyes narrowed. "I ain't afraid of you!" He shouted. "I SAID, I'm NOT afraid of you!" Dusty jumped off the life pod, the water breaking under him and sealing back over his head like a white scar. It felt cold as it engulfed him. As quickly as he got in, he was back at the surface sputtering and gasping, even if there was no water in his helmet. He looked every which was, swimming a bit back as a weird fish swam close, but seemed to small to be dangerous. The water was actually refreshing compared to the baking hot room that was his life pod. "WOOO! TAKE THAT OCEAN!" He shouted loudly, throwing his hands above his hand until such cause him to sink surprisingly quickly. The water closed over his head, and he looked around. He only had so much oxygen, the HUD displaying such. The fish flashed by his face again, a freaky thing that looked like it had sacks of air on ether sides of its body. A small pang of hunger bit like a small animal in his stomach. Could he actually EAT that? It flicker on. Well, if he wanted to... he'd have to catch it first. "Get back here dinner!" He gasped as he kicked out his legs, the flippers were actually very good, having no problems shooting him forwards. When he did grab the fish, he almost screamed and let go when it felt like holding a wet slimy piece of wood and stared at him with a big eye. "You're really freaky looking!" Dusty commented as he went back to the pod, climbing in through the bottom hatch. The fish he caught was still wriggling and flopping, Dusty almost dropped it when he placed it on the fabricator.

"The fabricator cooks small organisms, while disposing of the skeletal structure, bodily fluids and internal organs, thus rendering them safe for human consumption."

"Yum." He muttered as he watched the fish go from living to dinner. Even if it was cooked, that eye of its still seemed to be staring at him. Gingerly, he pulled off his helmet and momentarily set it to the side.

"It is common for those accustomed to synthetic foods to be repulsed by the thought of eating an animal carcass. Try to remember that humans survived this way for many years. You can too."

"Thanks Siri!" He called out as he picked up his 'meal' staring for a moment before slowly pulling it apart. "Just think about how hungry you are just think about hungry you are!" He closed his eyes and forced himself to chew than swallow. "Bahhhhhh.....it's ......." he opened his eyes again. "Not that bad...." it tasted like....well, fish. Maybe a bit tangy, but not horrible. "I guess, hahaha I don't think Ryan would be able to eat this! He'd throw up just watching me!" He laughed as he pulled the camera from his helmet. "So this is....I have no idea, but it needs salt....despite coming from a salty ocean. Not that bad!" He took another bite, actually enjoying it a bit more. Maybe he was just too hungry to care.

It took him a few minutes, the fish was pretty moist too, so according to his HUD he got his water levels back to what could be considered safe. He wasn't able to eat it all, but didn't want to throw it back into the ocean. He hadn't seen any sharks yet, but that didn't mean there weren't any! "Day four, pod smells like fish, I'll have to build a better air filter... at least it's smoky fish!" He laughed. "Hey, hey, what did the ocean say to the fish? Nothin! It just waved!" He barked laughing, sitting back. If anyone ever did watch this, they would think he gone crazy already. Correction, he already was crazy before the darn ship crashed.

Dusty let himself rest for half an hour. It wasn't that he believed the whole 'swimming after eating gives you cramps' but starting now, he was going to have to divide his time wisely among tasks. Task number one, go collect stuff. Back in the water the red head went. Between his time below the waves, he saw beautiful sights of the safe shallows. For the next hour and a half, he gathered materials. He found some glowing purple acid mushrooms, some quartz, even some metal salvage from what he could only assume was once of the now exploded Aurora. As brave as he totally was, Dusty could not will himself to go out of view of the life pod that floated along the surface. From what he could tell, that pod, his pod, was the only 'land' in this entire planet. The furthest he dared to go, he saw what looked like tall kelp which made the water look green. No further. On the other side, the water got deeper, and deeper, and darker and darker. He did not want to go out there. So he didn't. It was as simple as that. Stay here with his pod, with the fabricator, where he would be found soon enough. It was the fourth day... it took more than four days for a recuse ship to come. He'd be fine till than, catch himself more fish and gather more things. Dotting the ground were lots of limestone outcrops. He stared at them until some text rolled across the screen of his helmet, and he swam up to the surface as he read it.

"These unusual geological structures often form around titanium and copper deposits, and are distinct to this planet. Closer analysis reveals the stone around the metal has been hardened against erosion, but the mechanism remains unknown."

That sounded promising. Taking a deep breath he swam down, and raising his fist he struck at it. He wished he had a knife, but hadn't exactly gotten around to making himself one. It hurt a bit, before a few more swings broke it and he grabbed what came put before making a beeline to the surface.

Copper is an essential component of all powered equipment. Your probability of survival has just increased by 11%." His PDA beeped. By now, the sudden and abrupt speech didn't startle him as much anymore. He still gave a loud cry and through his fists above his head. "11 percent! Wooo!" And power meant he could make batteries right? With the copper in hand he swam back and started building with what he had collected, first off was a knife so he no longer had to beat his fists to a pulp to get stuff. He could barely contain his grin when the knife fabricated into existence.

"Weapons were removed from standard survival blueprints following the massacre on Obraxis Prime. As an essential survival tool for 2.5 million years, the knife remains the only exception. Sorry about that." The PDA bleeped as he picked up the tool. To be honest, the only other two 'weapons' he knew how to use were explosives, and a sword. That came from being a kid, were he and Ryan used to spar all the time with fake swords they'd carved, as both of them had a bit of a addiction to old stories about knights from the time of a ruler named King Arthur. It had been nothing more than ancient history, but it didn't stop them from looking up a tutorial and trying. In fact, they both were very good at it too, even to this day.

The skill still worked, it would help a daggers weren't all too different from swords, spare the range difference and the handling. Okay. It was quiet a bit different, but it didn't stop him from spinning the blade around on his finger before giving off a few swipes at the air. He made a few other things, like make shift batteries and such. He gave himself a rest and caught another fish (another weird one with big glowing eyes that practically took up its whole body) and ate it just as the sun started going down. Maybe it didn't change that the floor was still hard as a bricklayer, but having a knife in reach made him feel much safer. Yet... even if he felt much better than last night and the night before..... He still had a sickening sense of worry that hung around, wondering where Ryan was.

(This isn't the end! So don't hold your breath here! I'll update whenever I have time, at least every week if possible, sorry about the recent slow update, was very busy ^^')