Test Dive #1

[subnauticmods]

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TEST DIVE MEME


For information about the animals and locations, be sure to check out the BIOME and BASE pages!

A1: Go Fish
You! Yes, you! Your friendly neighbourhood AI has a task she would like to encourage YOU to do! After all, you can’t forget the most important fact: you’re here to make the planet habitable. Which means cataloguing, capturing and studying potential threats to anyone’s life. That includes a swarm of Stalkers that have been hanging around the waters awfully near the base, which presents a perfect research opportunity! At least, URSULA seems to think so.

Don’t go in willy-nilly waving your knife around, though. URSULA doesn’t want you to bring in tonight’s Sashimi Surprise™, she wants you to bring in a Stalker that’s still kicking. Which means you have to capture a live one. So hold back your crazy power or trigger-happy instincts!

How will you take one in alive without ending up dead yourself? You could go in the brute-force way, slamming its jaws shut and bagging it, though it’s pretty strong itself… or you could be a bit more cunning, taming it with bait or giving it shiny metal salvage to play with before luring it into a tank to bring it into the base. You might want to get a helping hand with this task, since it’s not exactly an easy one-man job.

A2: Go With Fish
So, now you’ve got a live and very disgruntled Stalker on your hands! Hopefully, said hands don’t have to be amputated (it’s okay if they have to though, URSULA will fix it. Try not to watch the nanites go). What do you do with it? You could keep it as a pet and observe its growth! You could dissect it and study its anatomy! Or you could… eat it. (After going through all the effort to bring it in alive?!)

B: The Abysmal Sea
You’re stranded.

One of the planet’s troublesome signal-interfering pulses has just made your communication devices 100% nonfunctional. No matter how you try to call URSULA for help, she isn’t able to respond. The database strapped to your wrist is just a useless chunk of metal now, leaving you without a useful library of knowledge to survive off. If you were driving any underwater vehicle prior to this point, it’s broken down. And unless you’re a mechanic, it’ll be pretty hard to get it jumpstarted again.

Don’t fret! The communication systems always come online eventually, so if you stay put, it’ll boot back up and give you directions straight back to base so you can finally get home. But can you really afford to stay put? The sunlight’s slowly streaming out of the sky, leaving the waters darker and darker with each passing second. Soon, you won’t be able to see five feet in front of you, and the only warning you’ll get of any approaching threat is through sound, if they even make any.

You have a few choices: take a daring risk and try swimming back to base, but on the off-chance you don’t remember the directions correctly from before you were cut off, you’re going to get even more lost, in the darkness of the night no less. Or, you could huddle in, with any friends if they were unfortunate enough to be with you, and start focusing on getting warm. Because spending the night out here in the vast oceans with the entire world against you is becoming a very, very real possibility.

C: It’s dangerous to go alone. Take them!
URSULA’s technology is breathtaking. With enough materials, she could make practically anything: weapons, vehicles, all those human comforts and entertainments she forgot to build... or perhaps she could expand the base to give everyone even more leg room. But there’s a catch: you need to get those materials to her in the first place, and scavenging can be a monumental task.

The planet Iniidae has a plethora of materials to provide, but you’ve got to go find them first. Some are easy enough to get, by plucking off the ground or breaking a rock. But some are a bit more challenging, such as Crash Powder, seeing that the Crash defending it will literally explode in your face if you get too close. And then there’s materials such as Blood Oil, only harvestable within the Blood Kelp Caves several hundred meters underwater in the pitch-black darkness… remember, you have to gather resources with your two bare hands. No such thing as driving around and conveniently collecting them within the somewhat-relative safety of an armored vehicle.

Since it’s so dangerous to go alone, URSULA will encourage you all to leave the base in pairs or groups if you’re going to try collecting some of the more precarious materials to harvest. She has heard that most lifeforms find being reconstituted from nanites traumatic, so try not to die in front of each other!

D: Hide and Seek Help
URSULA knows that everyone needs downtime, and no one can go salvaging or gathering specimens all the time. So what do you do for fun on an alien ocean planet when the AI who made your base forgot to make any kind of entertainment room?

Why, play hide-and-seek, of course! There’s a lot of places to hide away from others, and it’s challenging to find anyone. (Sometimes, too challenging to find them… ever… but that’s not the point.) The area around the base and submarine is relatively safe, so anyone can hide away in a coral structure or a cave, and telepathy makes it easy to taunt your seekers without revealing where you are.

Of course, you may encounter a Bone Shark or even a stray Stalker, and you won’t have time to get away or even scream as it attacks you, but hey. What other way to make hide-and-seek more thrilling than to turn it into hide-and-hope-you-get-found-as-you-shout-for-help-to-anyone-who-can-hear-your-telepathy?

E: Toilet Humor
Really, it was bound to happen eventually. Someone's in the bathroom observatory, doing their 'business', and someone is trying very hard to catch a fish for dinner outside. Your eyes meet. Someone has literally been caught with their pants down.

And in that moment your telepathy goes a little wonky, because it's good to have open communication about this incident.

F: The Caverns of Dream
The ocean calls you. Of course, it's much easier to dismiss it as nightmares. You'll probably think that's all it is after you have them. Flashes of screaming sea creatures writhing in agony, pleading for help, but these creatures can't ask for help, can they? Something huge, beyond the scope of imagination, moves in the ocean of your dreams and calls out to you to go deeper into the darkness. It pleads and begs but not with a voice you can hear or words you can understand.

You wake up in a sweat with the unrelenting desire to take a swim, even though it's late and everyone is asleep. Or maybe someone else just had the same nightmare as you? Are you willing to take a swim and try to understand the dream?

BASED ON CODE BY TESSISAMESS AND SUPERSUITS

Comments

[leftinme]

[Brett really would rather prefer better discussion and cooperation—this is why he vastly prefers working with the captain and Iris and not some stranger (let alone a human). Still, he doesn't have much of a choice in the matter: once he realizes what Ellana is doing, he attempts to add to the force via using his mist to throw the creature up as well. For added measure, he keeps part of his mist touching the fish, following it in its trajectory through the air, so that if the fish does risk colliding with the tank instead of properly falling in it, he can phase it through.

Which, as it turns out, is needed. When it looks as if the Stalker is about to hit the edge, it instead passes through. Once it's in the water, rendering Brett's ability unneeded, his shadows withdraw, going back to swirling around him. For a few moments, he watches the fish warily, before:]

Is that all?

[maserannas]

[ They're at least on the same page wishing that the present reality was otherwise, but having been thrust into situations where she's had to work alongside people who outright threatened to kill her if she stepped out of line, while marked by something none of them really understood (or hadn't, back then)... well. Wishes amounted to little. Their slap-dash cooperation took care of the big, fishy problem, and as Ellana stands there in her wetsuit and pulls her breather out of her mouth, she has to look around.

They're in a room that's been drenched and wrecked by the Stalker's thrashing about before they tanked it. Various items are knocked over, in disarray, and water is pooling around their feet (and his shadows, that's much stranger now that she's seeing them with a less pressing target on hand). Turning with Brett still in her peripheral vision, she reaches out, pulling on invisible lines back toward herself. The top of the tank settles back into place, the sloshing water from the Stalker cut down to minimal splashing. ]

Can you see the latching mechanism?

[ For the lid. Not answering the other question right now since the answer to that is no, but I have a funny idea you're going to slip away which would leave the whole of the room to her to take care of setting to rights. Tugging her goggles down and allowing them to rest around her neck, she rests her fingers along her jawbone. ]

I'd like to make sure he stays in there and doesn't throw himself back out to flop around in front of us all over again.

[ Considering further thrashing includes an attempt to charge up and into the aerated top, those worries don't appear to be foundless. ]

[leftinme]

[Brett hopes that he won't be the one responsible for cleaning this mess up (though if push comes to shove... well, he's used to work, especially considering how lazy the captain could be). As he similarly pulls down his goggles, he shoots her a glance. While he would, unsurprisingly, like to slip away now, he can in fact see the latching mechanism and understands the logic in dealing with it, so.

A tendril of mist extends from his shadows, curling upwards towards the latch and setting in place without Brett otherwise moving. There.]

...

[maserannas]

[ She... snorts, a soft sound, when she sees that. Particularly as it's done in silence. Not much for talking, is he? ]

Thank you.

[ She ends up repeating. Again, better to try and foster positive relationships instead of allowing them to be negative from the start. Been there, worked against that, prefers not to go back to it if she can avoid it. The friendships formed had been worth it, though the setting could have been improved.

You know, with less "doom upon the world" going on. (Was there really any less of it now?) ]

Just leaves us with setting this place to rights again before we head off on our own again.

[ Since they do have to live and work here. ]

[leftinme]

[Brett isn't great at fostering positive relationships when they're not with dragons, which may or may not be becoming increasingly evident as he remains silent. As if ignoring her presence, he begins using his shadows to pick up fallen objects and right them once more (not much he can do about the water at their feet; his shadows can't hold onto that). Seeing as how she hasn't said anything he needs to directly reply to, he won't.]

[maserannas]

[ ... Really chatty.

Either way, she likewise joins in with righting what they can, and looking for implements to use to herd the water. She finds a tray over what appears to be a drain. Pried up off the floor, it allows the pooled water to slowly start trickling out. ]

So what should I call you?

[ She asks while she pries up the tray, stuck to the ground through sheer force of happy suction between the water and some air trapped underneath it. It gives with an audible pop. ]

[leftinme]

[...]

Is there a reason you need to know my name?

[His tone is curt. It, uh, doesn't take a genius that he's not exactly interested in giving what he considers to be a human his name.]

[maserannas]

[ This is... going somewhere very, very slowly. Ellana lifts her eyebrows a fraction, setting down the tray she's holding in hand with a gentle clink. The Stalker bashes against the side of its tank to a muffled thud, leading to her tipping her head it's way, eyes flicking toward it in speculation. She hopes that tank holds the creature, but what exactly is Ursula going to do with a live specimen?

... A fillet might be nice? ]

You might say I've grown fond of introductions over the years. [ A pause. ] That, and I'm terrible at nicknames.

[leftinme]

[Welcome to Bonding With Brett When You're Not a Dragon 101: it's a very lengthy course.

Likewise, he shoots the Stalker a worried glance, his shadows not presently sorting things away flaring up lest he need to subdue the creature, before they relax once more.]

Don't even think about it. [Giving him a nickname, that is.] ... Brett. Brett Graves.

[maserannas]

[ Ellana has never been to formalised education, more of a self studier as well as someone out of a society of (sadly warped over time) oral traditions. Here goes something...!

Such as a half smile and a polite dip of her head his way while she squats to pick up a series of instruments strew across the damp floor. Interesting to note how his shadow-tendril-tentacle-whatsits respond to him and his moods, presuming he was likewise on edge with the Stalker issue. ]

It's nice to meet you, Brett.

[ Does she introduce herself in turn? Not right now. She wonders at what point, if any, he'll ask. Sooner rather than later if her statement about being fond of introductions irritates him when she doesn't immediately give on in turn, or if he decides it doesn't matter. Wouldn't be the first time she's responded to hey, you. ]

[leftinme]

[It's nice to meet you, Brett. The sentiment is very much not mutual, and he doubts that it's even sincere on her part to begin with. He hasn't given her a reason to like him; he has no interest in doing so either.]

Tch.

[... Similarly, he doesn't care what her name is, so after glancing at her and making that dismissive sound, he goes back to cleaning up with a disinterested look.]

[maserannas]

[ One point to the school of thought in which he doesn't ask at all. Ellana gives a small shake of her head as she continues cleaning up, now looking for something to help encourage the water down toward the drain. Too bad it wasn't an element anyone dealt with. Fire, lightning, spirit, ice.

... Technically two of those could be solutions, but they were both poor ones, and she'd personally always done better with lightning than complex fire or more than simple ice. Electrocuting everything was probably not a great plan of action. ]

Where are you from?

[ As long as they're cleaning up, she'll play the annoying one. Honestly, it's easier asking a stranger all the getting to know you questions that he'll probably fight against answering than being left too much to her own thoughts. The fact he's unlikely to be curious in turn is an unintentional boon. ]

[leftinme]

[Brett would really rather she not electrocute everything, as this isn't how he'd like to test his endurance against that sort of thing.]

Does it matter?

[maserannas]

[ Does it? Technically yes and no; it was relevant for some kinds of understandings, but they're all here now, and isn't that what's more important? Besides, people not talking about much of their past, even where they're from, isn't strange. It's not even necessarily something everyone asks after.

And if he said nothing of Thedas, or anything she knew, how relevant would it be? ]

Only when we want it to matter. In the end, we're all here now, and it's more important if that's where we all plan on being once again. Knowing more than that isn't necessary.

[ Not from her present point of view. She's aware enough to acknowledge that might change, but... she glances his way. ]

Those shadows of yours... how is it you manipulate them like you do?

[ He'd been surprised by her magic, but so far, he hadn't started calling her a mage, or even implied anything much about it. Then again... he's been quiet. Surly. Attempting not to engage, while likewise assisting. She can't say it indicates much that he doesn't ask when as a whole, most his questions are, "Do I have to?" ]

[leftinme]

[He could elect not to answer this as well, but honestly, he finds it pretty self-explanatory, so he might as well.]

... I'm a dragon. It's my natural ability.

[He doesn't know how to explain it better than that. It's simply a part of whom he is, and most people, where he's from, would likely accept that as soon as he mentioned being a dragon—which isn't something he feels the need to hide, for all the harm that his species has inflicted. He's never had the sort of carefree cheer that those like Efina do over being a dragon, and thus it might be a lie to say that he's happy being one, but this is the life he's been given and so he'll stand tall about what he is.]

[maserannas]

[ She barely bites back on dumbly parroting the word dragon. She's fought dragons, at all stages of maturity, both because it has been necessary, or because she was under attack by controlled dragons. Brett Graves has an odd power, but that has no relationship to dragons that she knows. Sure, they're more resistant to the Blight, which makes Archdemons something more of a curiosity, but this?

He's a young man. Not human, she wouldn't mistake him for that with those ears and his overall build, but not a dragon. ]

I... might need you to explain what a dragon is on your world. You look nothing like the ones we have on mine. You're also a better conversationalist.

[ Attempt at levity made, the slight confusion on her face has her resting another tray against her hip, evaluating Brett all over again. Shapeshifting? It could be possible, but she's never heard of a dragon gaining the ability. Only others gaining shapeshifting abilities, and amoung those, dragon shifting was not common. Morrigan, Flemeth... two people she could name, and both women of a certain amount of influence and power, however behind the scenes. ]

[leftinme]

[Brett's expression twitches into a (deeper) frown, as he's not sure what that last bit is supposed to mean, especially since he's well aware that he's not a good conversationalist—even around other dragons.

It's strange, having to keep in mind that things are different across worlds. As rare as dragons are in his country, people tend to know what they are. As he tenses underneath her gaze, his shadows continue to swirl around him.]

... What's a dragon on your world?

[maserannas]

[ Her tolerance for dodging answers has gone down over time, particularly when it may be relevant to what she needs to know. What it mostly means is she gears herself up for an exchange, asking Brett in turn: ]

If I answer your question, will you answer my question to you as well?

[ She's not supporting this as a one sided exchange. Both ways? Ellana is more than happy to comply for now. ]

[leftinme]

[In this case, Brett isn't even being evasive to be rude as so much as he's doing it out of defence. Ellana may consider his answer relevant to what she needs to know; to Brett, his well-being is potentially at stake here depending on how he responds. She hasn't given any indication that she thinks fondly of dragons, and while, again, he won't shy away from hi nature, he sees no reason to elaborate on it if it means potentially giving her any weaknesses.

He's learned the hard way that the more people know about his species, the worse it can be for him, after all.]

If I deem you to not be dangerous, then fine.

[maserannas]

[ There's a certain irony that what makes his species targeted is something elves have been targeted and used for, though in some empires, it's for the sake of performing blood magic with them as a central sacrifice. The price of being more sensitive to the Fade even amoung those who aren't mages by birthright.

It's not an unreasonable answer, as it were; granted, the divergences between Brett and the dragons she knows are so large that he'd need to be an active threat in turn to garner her desire to kill. So to her, it's still more evasion: he's already shown he can get away, and she's not planning on hitting so fast that his shadows can't pull him into his own safety-net. Or can't attack her, she supposes. All things are possible. ]

Hm... hard to say what you deem dangerous or not, but fine. It's worth trying, I suppose.

[ She turns and sets down the tray on a metal table, lifting her feet up high as she moves toward a collection of strewn about instruments. A flick of her foot dislodges water droplets for no grand purpose, considering she steps back down against a wet surface once more, but it felt like some form of release either way. ]

The dragons I'm familiar with are at minimum, soon after hatching, both ravenous and as large as a horse. They're flightless at that point, and the drakes remain that way from what the scholars on the subject have told me. The females who live past a hundred years or so are the truly impressive creatures, shoulder three or so of my height at minimum, length more than double or triple that. They fly, and they've elemental breath attacks of their own.

[ They're beautiful, frightening for sheer power, and to be respected. A few were also, unfortunately, prone to attacking people, and made themselves nuisances that had to be handled. That they're also Blight resistant... she shakes her head, sounding almost regretful. ]

It's unfortunate, but when they cross over and start attacking people's settlements, they have to be driven off or killed. They don't reason. They're exceptional creatures, but not intelligent. Cunning, though. Very cunning, and awe inspiring to see in person. Also entirely likely to devour you.

[leftinme]

[Brett listens, his expression a mixture of deeply curious and tense (and it may or may not start twitching into a frown towards the end, when she talks about about them attacking people's settlements and being driven off or killed). Even knowing that these seem to be a different species than his, from what she's said about them, it still sits poorly with him when he intuitively associates "dragons" with, well, his kind.

After a long pause, with his shadows swirling around him lest he need to get away, he reluctantly replies:]

... Where I'm from, we're born from eggs as well, though we tend to be the size of a human child. At the end of our growth, we're not likely to be any taller than what's normal for a human. It's said that the lifespan of a dragon is two hundred years, and all of us can fly—it's just a matter of being able to properly being able to manifest your wings.

[So he supposes that, theoretically, a dragon could be capable of flight after birth, but generally, they lack the necessary control at that point.]

Not all of us have elemental breath attacks, though some do. One of the things that primarily sets us apart from human is that we have unique powers. [...] You've already seen mine.

[It's here that his face takes on a sharper edge, his voice sounding a little indignant almost as if it's somehow Ellana's fault that dragons are what they are in her world.]

And we don't randomly attack people or eat them! If anything, seeing as how most of the police force is made up of dragons, we're the ones protecting the peace in the country.

[Largely thanks to the Captain, since from what Brett knows, dragons weren't so common on the police force when Neil's master was alive (not so much out of prejudice towards dragons, but realizing the internal conflict it would bring considering the poor relationship between the two species—for better or for worse, the presence of dragons has driven out numerous humans from the force who didn't care for being surrounded by beings who didn't like them. Brett can't bring himself to feel sorry, when humans have elsewhere they can be; for the dragons, this is the only place they'll ever be relatively safe).]

[maserannas]

Well. Count me as glad to hear that.

[ A simple statement, without humour or sarcasm. It's better to hear that his kind of dragon isn't prone to random attacks or devouring people. That'd be highly inconvenient.

"Police" doesn't mean anything as a force, but the action, that she can understand. So the dragons served on a guard of some kind, as a peacekeeping force. She's been listening the whole time with a look of quiet attentiveness and concentration: forcing herself to hear what it is he's saying, juggling her own preconceptions the whole time.

We're born from eggs as well, though we tend to be the size of a human child. Curious, and different from how most people are born on her world. There's a niggling curiosity for if his birth can be more comparable to the emergence of a spirit in the Fade... particularly when she looks him over.

Humans don't lay eggs. Anything sporting a child-sized individual wouldn't pass through a human system, even taking into account some of the larger humans in her experience. They're not so different from elves that she really needs to imagine a human woman in labour over an egg, but as most races running around on Thedas go, even the Qunari didn't give birth to small children. ]

Are you widely accepted in your roles as peacekeepers?

[ Is his world more accepting of magic? He calls it unique powers, and she believes that: as unique magical abilities. It's not so strange from that standpoint in the end. ]

Where do your eggs come from? I can't imagine anyone of the size you indicate laying them, for various... [ she moved her hand, rolling her wrist to make a small, encompassing gesture — "physically impossible" ] ... reasons.

[leftinme]

We do our job well. For the most part, no one can complain.

[Generally, people are okay with having them as the police, yes, especially seeing as how they're best equipped to deal with abnormal cases such as that vampire one; however, Brett feels it would be inaccurate to say that they're widely accepted in general.

If they were, dragons wouldn't have to live in fear of being kidnapped and sold. If they were, the dragons that didn't want to be part of the police force wouldn't have to have their identity rewritten to be human in order to live a normal life, even if most of those who chose that option were content.

The captain dreamed of creating a world where it didn't matter if you were a human or a dragon. Brett's torn between supporting him in that—because it's an admirable goal—and feeling, on an intuitive level, that it's a dream that will never come true.]

... No one knows. They simply appear out of the blue. We don't have biological parents like your kind do.

[Oh, one could wax poetic and theorize that they came from God, or some such, but at the end of the day, it's all still up in the air. And he supposes that technically, their master is their "parent" and often seen as such, but it leaves a bitter taste in his mouth to think of the man whom he was born for as anything but a scumbag that he's not sorry about killing.]

[maserannas]

[ She finds his admission surprising. People usually resented those who were different, those who had powers they couldn't control, and placing those people as the protectors? Did not always earn favour, and often had the opposite reaction. Then again, she knows so little of his world or context, perhaps there are other factors that allow for an acceptance she'd find believable on her own world only under extenuating circumstances, or after successful revolutions. Or rebellions. Changing political structures is a necessity, no matter how one looks at it.

Something she and her Keeper agreed on, operating distantly from one another. ]

You mean to say you simply... manifest? For no reason whatsoever?

[ Not disbelieving: surprised, however. For a creature to simply manifest... wouldn't there be a catalyst? Even with spirits, and to an extent, demons, it was a reflection of what was going on in the waking world, creating in the realm of the Fade the echoes of the waking world's preoccupations. ]