I've been doing very little creative recently, but came across a story (and format) that I actually felt like writing a fair bit on. Essentially, I'm going for telling the story of Subnautica in the deadpan style of The Martian. Comments etc. are appreciated! I'm going to update whenever I can/feel like it/get frustrated and decide to do something for unwind other than sinking more hours into just playing Subnautica.
If you haven't played Subnautica, go do so immediately (or at least watch someone on Youtube). It's in Alpha but very excellent.
If you haven't read/watched The Martian, how are you able to view this thread from Mars?
Journal of Ryan Hiramoto
Posting: Specialist, 1st Grade - Alterra Corporation
Current Location: Planet 4546B, Ariadne Arm
Day 1, Hour 1
Well, I'm fucked.
3 Hours Earlier
'It's beautiful!' exclaimed Specialist Quin, looking at the approaching planet through a viewport as she did her final round of inspections. 'It's like a... blue gem, just shimmering in the sun.'
Specialist Hiramoto groaned. Quin shot him a withering look.
'It's a blue world, Erma,' he said dryly. 'Okay, very rare. But they're almost as pretty as they are boring. Abundant resources, endless heatsinking potential... no challenge. Remember 3381J?'
'Oh, right, I forgot,' Quin replied dryly. 'You're the weird one who actually likes toiling for days on a rad-scorched dustball because it's 'interesting'.
1 Hours Earlier
'What's the story?' Project Manager Cole called casually from down the corridor as he approached Hiramoto. Most of the crew had already reported to launch assignments or to the viewing lounges, leaving only a few supervisors tending to last-minute tasks - and making conversation through the often-crowed corridors easier. The Specialist straightened, shocks of black hair swishing slightly as he turned.
'Everything's sorted. Just doing final check on the subs. I haven't worked with they Cyclops model before, wanted to make sure I didn't miss anything.'
'Then grab a seat and watch planetfall!' Cole exclaimed, pausing a junction away to fiddle with his PDA. 'If there was anything wrong on one of these boats, they'd let you know - the new AA is more pushy than-'
PM Andy Cole disintegrated, the tattered wreck of his form ripped out into the vacuum that appeared as a giant fissure was gouged in a horrid instant out of the hull.
Hiramoto instinctively tried to reach out, and to scream. His voice died in the rushing air as he was dragged forward by the pressure differential. An emergency bulkhead snapped into place, almost removing his arm. A shrill, synthetic klaxxon began to wail throughout the ship as an unworried artificial voice filled the halls, repeating ceaselessly.
'Emergency. Severe structural compromise to the Aurora. All hands, abandon ship. Emergency...'
Ryan Hiramoto followed the automated signage to the nearest distress pod and launched it. Staring in disbelief through the tiny circular porthole in the ceiling, he watched the Alterra Corporation exploration ship Aurora suffer violent explosions from bow to stern.
I Am The Islander (Subnautica)
Moderator: LadyTevar
Re: I Am The Islander (Subnautica)
Journal of Ryan Hiramoto
Posting: Specialist, 1st Grade - Alterra Corporation
Current Location: Planet 4546B, Ariadne Arm
Day 1, Hour 1 (Entry 2)
Well, I'm less fucked than I could be.
I managed to extinguish the fire in the escape pod without burning to death or asphyxiating. Side benefit - I don't have to be that guy who burned to death on a planet 99.97% covered in water.
I was in Escape Pod 5. It happened to be nearest to me when the... whatever happened, happened. Unfortunately, it's also in the one that's least accessible, and closest to the work stations of the jerkoffs in Arcometrics.
So naturally, half the inventory of survival kit is missing.
Full accounting, based on the inventory on the PDA;
- PDA with Built-In Artificial Assistant (AA) - check. Obviously.
- 2 Bottles, Sterile Water - check.
- 5 Blocks, Grade AA+ Nutiform - 2 present. 3 missing.
- Radiation Suit - missing.
- 3 Emergency flares - 2 present. 1 missing. Fire alarm in Arcometrics' bunks last week now explained.
- Omni-Med First Aid Kit - check. If there was one thing to still be in one piece, glad that was it.
As for the pod itself. Standard solar/inertial charging power cells; two working, one currently disabled, one a charred mess. Fabricator working normally. Okay, I lied - if there was one thing I really needed to work, it's the automated fabricator. It's a hack for disaster survival. Not a level skip hack, but, like, 'unlock all guns and armour'.
Communications array is damaged. Main power panel is damaged. The faceplate of the panel is what knocked me out cold during planetfall.
Speaking of which - personal status. Bruised to hell. Could have been a lot worse. My crew jumpsuit is mostly in one piece.
Okay, inventory done - let's pop the hatch.
Day 1, Hour 2
Good news - I'm close to the Aurora crash site, in shallow water.
Bad news - I don't see any other pods on the surface - no movement around the wreck I can see with my naked eye either. I know I saw other pods launching, so hopefully they're just scattered. I hope Erma's okay, even though she's a brat.
She would have liked the view - aside from the burning wreckage of the ship, anyway. Nothing but placid blue sea and wispy clouds. 4546B has near-Earth atmospheric chemistry and equatorial temperatures - apparently. Something like 3% of the Human population has been to Earth, but at least equatorial is synonymous for "pleasantly warm".
I've tried to peer into the water off the ladder just in case there's aggressive local fauna (or flora, I've had a buddy eaten by a really angry tree before), but it looks safe. Time for a swim.
Posting: Specialist, 1st Grade - Alterra Corporation
Current Location: Planet 4546B, Ariadne Arm
Day 1, Hour 1 (Entry 2)
Well, I'm less fucked than I could be.
I managed to extinguish the fire in the escape pod without burning to death or asphyxiating. Side benefit - I don't have to be that guy who burned to death on a planet 99.97% covered in water.
I was in Escape Pod 5. It happened to be nearest to me when the... whatever happened, happened. Unfortunately, it's also in the one that's least accessible, and closest to the work stations of the jerkoffs in Arcometrics.
So naturally, half the inventory of survival kit is missing.
Full accounting, based on the inventory on the PDA;
- PDA with Built-In Artificial Assistant (AA) - check. Obviously.
- 2 Bottles, Sterile Water - check.
- 5 Blocks, Grade AA+ Nutiform - 2 present. 3 missing.
- Radiation Suit - missing.
- 3 Emergency flares - 2 present. 1 missing. Fire alarm in Arcometrics' bunks last week now explained.
- Omni-Med First Aid Kit - check. If there was one thing to still be in one piece, glad that was it.
As for the pod itself. Standard solar/inertial charging power cells; two working, one currently disabled, one a charred mess. Fabricator working normally. Okay, I lied - if there was one thing I really needed to work, it's the automated fabricator. It's a hack for disaster survival. Not a level skip hack, but, like, 'unlock all guns and armour'.
Communications array is damaged. Main power panel is damaged. The faceplate of the panel is what knocked me out cold during planetfall.
Speaking of which - personal status. Bruised to hell. Could have been a lot worse. My crew jumpsuit is mostly in one piece.
Okay, inventory done - let's pop the hatch.
Day 1, Hour 2
Good news - I'm close to the Aurora crash site, in shallow water.
Bad news - I don't see any other pods on the surface - no movement around the wreck I can see with my naked eye either. I know I saw other pods launching, so hopefully they're just scattered. I hope Erma's okay, even though she's a brat.
She would have liked the view - aside from the burning wreckage of the ship, anyway. Nothing but placid blue sea and wispy clouds. 4546B has near-Earth atmospheric chemistry and equatorial temperatures - apparently. Something like 3% of the Human population has been to Earth, but at least equatorial is synonymous for "pleasantly warm".
I've tried to peer into the water off the ladder just in case there's aggressive local fauna (or flora, I've had a buddy eaten by a really angry tree before), but it looks safe. Time for a swim.
Re: I Am The Islander (Subnautica)
Day 1, Hour 3
Wow.
I did a standard-practice first exploration - used the lower hatch on the pod so as not to make a big splash, and looked around. Nothing ate me. Yay!
Then I swam out about 5 meters from the pod and made a circle around, just to get an impression of my surroundings.
This planet really is beautiful. I'm in some shallows, light-coloured sand and a few rock formations. Lots of wildlife - analogues of coral, plants, underwater fungus, and whole schools of what pass as fish. I might even have to apologize to Erma at this rate. Even in the middle of the day, almost everything living seems to glow. Given that I haven't died of radiation sickness, I'm going to assume bioluminescence is common on 4546B.
I did some quick math - with only two nutrient blocks on hand, I have about a week and a half of food. It's tasteless, dense, chewy, and the best concentrated nutrition If there are more survivors in the immediate area, that's plenty. If not... that's not.
Two bottles of water is much more restrictive - only two days worth. Sure, there's quite a bit of bound-up water in the food blocks as well, but I could die of micronutrient toxicity if I tried to use them as my only water source.
That much food and that little water supply made no sense, so I re-checked the manifest. There were supposed to be 20 bottles, not 2. If anyone from Arcometrics survived I'll drown them myself.
Still no sign of movement I can see around the ship, which is concerning. I'm going to try and gather some samples of local life and materials to see if I can exploit them for water - I might as well start adding entries to the PDA for reference while I'm at it.
Wow.
I did a standard-practice first exploration - used the lower hatch on the pod so as not to make a big splash, and looked around. Nothing ate me. Yay!
Then I swam out about 5 meters from the pod and made a circle around, just to get an impression of my surroundings.
This planet really is beautiful. I'm in some shallows, light-coloured sand and a few rock formations. Lots of wildlife - analogues of coral, plants, underwater fungus, and whole schools of what pass as fish. I might even have to apologize to Erma at this rate. Even in the middle of the day, almost everything living seems to glow. Given that I haven't died of radiation sickness, I'm going to assume bioluminescence is common on 4546B.
I did some quick math - with only two nutrient blocks on hand, I have about a week and a half of food. It's tasteless, dense, chewy, and the best concentrated nutrition If there are more survivors in the immediate area, that's plenty. If not... that's not.
Two bottles of water is much more restrictive - only two days worth. Sure, there's quite a bit of bound-up water in the food blocks as well, but I could die of micronutrient toxicity if I tried to use them as my only water source.
That much food and that little water supply made no sense, so I re-checked the manifest. There were supposed to be 20 bottles, not 2. If anyone from Arcometrics survived I'll drown them myself.
Still no sign of movement I can see around the ship, which is concerning. I'm going to try and gather some samples of local life and materials to see if I can exploit them for water - I might as well start adding entries to the PDA for reference while I'm at it.
Last edited by Venator on 2016-06-01 06:01pm, edited 1 time in total.
Re: I Am The Islander (Subnautica)
Double post, will use this for the next updates. Sorry.