*Epic Subnautica Music Here*

"This is lifepod 5! If anyone is out there, we need medical assistance – my podmate was hit by some kind of exploding native creature, she's in a bad way! If anyone is out there, we need assistance from someone with more medical experience than 'this is what the PDA said to do'! Please help! Our cords are attached."

Jaune and Nora heard the distress signal at the same time through their PDAs.

"That was Dove! My roommate on the Beacon. I'm headed over, you?"

"It's kind of my job to rush to the aid of anyone who needs it. But I don't know much about medicine…"

"I know some first aid for the field. Lets go."

As the two of them oriented themselves in the direction of the distress beacon, they found themselves facing the direction the giant monster had withdrawn towards. The moment of silence and stillness was followed by an unspoken agreement and the two turned towards the left by a decent margin and start swimming. Nothing short of their respective life partners was going to convince them to get anywhere near that beasty again.

As the two of them swam, they stayed near the surface – it was faster that way – and kept their trend leftward until they seemed to enter a new environment. This region was markedly different from where they had found themselves – their starting point had been just a bit behind the Beacon itself, seemingly sucked in its wake as it crashed and then left to drift behind upside down. That region had been devastated, completely and utterly ruined. Sand, chunks of stone, and murky water had been the dominating features of the area. They'd seen in the distance a few large stationary darker blotches, but hadn't bothered to investigate them.

But if the starting point could be called a hellish sandy waste of metal shrapnel and gouged out dirt, this new region could be called downright verdant. The region was dominated by huge terraced pillars covered in deep red grassy seaweed of some sort. Each of the pillars was many dozens of meters tall, punching out of the flat grassy landscape like some sort of ancient Mistralian decorative tower, but with an alien twist. The flatlands in between each pillar were, well, flat. Devoid of much in the way of visible features aside from sand held in place by red seaweed, the flat areas had the occasional little track of sand and torn weeds, probably left by some sort of large herbivore feeding upon the plant life. Speaking of life, the region was filled with distant shoals of fish swimming amongst themselves, all of them strange and exotic colors.

The most unexpected aspect of this region, however, were most definitely the immensely massive creatures swimming slowly near the surface. They were far larger than anything else the two had seen so far, larger by far than the snake-eel-monster that had tried to eat them less than an hour ago. Neither wanted to get close, but there were no safe passages through the region except to go deep underwater – which neither were able to do as a result of damaged swimsuits not handling deep pressures anymore – or swim between the leviathan creatures and hope for the best.

Jaune and Nora carefully swam along the surface of the ocean, hoping to escape the notice of the leviathans. As they swam above them, Jaune took note of what seemed to be small reef systems on their backs. Fish flitted between the corals, weeds, and other such growths that seemed to sprout from great cracks and rends in the armored regions of the creatures. He saw numerous tiny fishes with a pair of huge eyes on each side of the head and a single massive fin forming a half-circle around the fish's main body. A sudden snap sound revealed a giant red and white tadpole that snapped after one of them, scattering the school into several smaller ones that left the tadpole confused and lost for a bit. A strange fish with a single eye on the back of a triangular body swam in a small shoal right near the leviathans back using a thin tail with a tall dorsal fin, looking almost like a shovel or spade. Jaune was just starting to relax when he noticed that Nora was missing.

While Jaune had been observing the creatures on the backs of the leviathan swimmers, Nora had been investing the swimmers themselves. Massive in size, truly immense, but slow and with no visible means of propulsion. The long tentacles (heh, tentacles) seemed to serve no purpose that she could find, though if attacked they could prove more prehensile than they appear. The base of the tentacles (heh) had some sort of strange bulbous glowing areas that, again, Nora could find no purpose for. Swimming underneath the massive creature and hoping there wasn't a mouth hiding here, Nora found to her surprise that the leviathan appeared to be swimming by taking water into a pair water-jets that pulled water into them on the front and expelled it out from the rear. They also seemed to have some sort of filters built into them, leading her to assume they were harmless filter feeders, like whales or narlacs. It was at this moment that Jaune called out her name.

"Nora?! Nora where are you!"

"I'm down here, look at these awesome beasties!"

"Nora, we need to reach Lifepod 5. We can't get distracted yet, only after we've done our best to help them."

"Ugg, fine!"

The two continued on their journey, passing over a thin stretch of what could only be described as a kelp forest, but encountering no further predatory lifeforms and spending no time to study the forest in question. They needed to reach the pod as quickly as possible, having taken such a detour as to avoid their big and hungry friend that had driven them away from their life pod.

Even with the urgency, however, the two were able to appreciate the colorful beauty of the shallows they had found themselves in. White sand covered much of it, with light tan stone creating terraces, columns, and even arches. Brilliantly colored plants and corals were everywhere, with green seaweed spreading across patches of sand and small reefs covering patches of rock. Exotic fish darted in and out of giant tubes with pearlescent interiors and green mottled exteriors, fleeing the two interlopers. Brightly colored creatures swam across the sand below them, large black bodies undulating with blue fins along the edges and bright orange and blue highlights. A small herd of rotund green creatures with thick, almost artificial looking faces and a strange glowing green orb attached to their rears swum away from them with a strange laughing sound as several of them expunged glowing orbs from their rears.

Before Nora could investigate, the orbs popped and spread out some green substance, which killed several unlucky blue fish with giant yellow eyes. Armed with the knowledge that even timid fish could kill them, the two swiftly made their way deeper into the shallow reef. Passing a volcanic geyser (and what was up with that?) the two saw the lifepod when they managed to get to the peak of a small wave. They were only a few dozen meters away, in fact, and were able to swiftly get to it and climb in.

Weiss was afraid of everything, and it was pissing Yang off. Sure, being nearly eaten by something with a mouth larger than your entire body was terrifying, and sure those monstrous toothpole fish were absolutely nightmarish (did they really need that many teeth?) but the simple reality was neither of those creatures were near the duo anymore. The monster that had tried to eat Weiss when she escaped the pod seemed to be sticking to the sea floor, and looked to be built to dig underground and ambush creatures that got too close. The toothpoles were perfectly happy to come to the surface, but due to the rough waves seemed to drive most creatures deeper into the water.

Yang scowled to herself again and looked up nervously. Normally paranoia would be just that, paranoia, but this was an alien planet and Yang didn't want to find out the hard way that there were dangerous predators that hunted from the sky. Especially not if the toothpoles and diggers were anything to go by, since if they were the airborn predators would probably be large enough to swallow them both whole.

"This is lifepod 5!" "

Weiss let out a shriek of paranoid fear as even Yang yelped and did her best impression of startled cat trying to jump out of a swimming pool.

If anyone is out there, we need medical assistance – my podmate was hit by some kind of exploding native creature, she's in a bad way! If anyone is out there, we need assistance from someone with more medical experience than 'this is what the PDA said to do'! Please help! Our cords are attached."

"Shit. Listen ma'am, we gotta respond to that. Not only is there safety in numbers, but an injured civvie is as much my job as keeping you safe. Plus, I have admittedly limited knowledge of emergency field medicine. It comes in handy."

"B-b-but what if-?"

"No buts or whats about it, we've got a job, cords, and a destination in mind. You can either come with me or I can tell your family and insurers that you were tragically eaten by something twice your size after abandoning your own crew to die."

"F-fine! B-but we're going to be careful, r-right?"

"Of course ma'am. My priority is you, so you don't need to worry about being sacrificed to save someone else. Not in this situation at least."

"That… that does not inspire confidence."

"Meh. Not my problem. Lets head ov-"

"BROOOOOOOOOOOOOWM"

"Nope. Nope nope nope. Not that direction anymore."

"Weiss, stop!"

Weiss had heard the great rumble and instantly started swimming away from it without a care in the world for what could be in front of her. Something able to make a noise that loud could NOT be safe for anyone, anywhere, ever. Yang, once again furious with her charge, rushed after her while glancing to the rear and seeing the admittedly massive leviathan-class life form. That said, Yang could tell from a glance that if this thing was a carnivore, it had a very different prey than humans. Something that large, slow, and poorly designed couldn't be a speed predator, if it was a predator at all. But her boss wasn't listening anymore, so Yang had no choice but to power after the white-haired woman.

"Weiss! Weiss if you don't stop right now so help me I'll use you as bait for the next carnivore!"

That got Weiss' attention, causing her to freeze, whimper, and then suddenly get angry and turn to glare at her 'protection'.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?! Do you even know who's signing your paychecks?!"

"Yes yes, calm down ma'am. I just needed you to stop."

"So you decided to threaten my life?!"

"it worked didn't it? Now hush. The lifepod is that way, and the big leviathans you bolted from don't eat creatures like us. They don't have the right build for it. Trust me, I know that much at least."

"…"

"Anyway, lets head over. We'll stay near the surface and try to avoid anything too aggressive looking or acting, sound good?"

"S-sure."

The two started swimming at the surface, heading towards the lifepod beacon superimposed upon their masks, and began to calm down. Nothing was attacking from the sky, not that Yang could see at least, and nothing seemed to be interested in getting too close to the surface from below either. It was almost peaceful, if not for the constant waves and the effort needed to swim. After about five minutes of this, Yang had enough and swam deeper, ignoring Weiss' squeak of fear as the white-haired woman followed her down. The environment they were now in was green tinted, with massive plants rising around them.

The massive kelp trees rose around them, shadowing the lower regions if not for the brightly glowing collections of what appeared to be seed pods clustered near the base of the main bushy parts of the vines. The bushy parts themselves generally extended between five and fifteen meters in overall height, and were anchored to the sea floor by long thinner extensions that were covered in the patchy remains of old leaves and growths, even having little flowers mixed in. Swimming along with the two survivors were dozens of fish, all of them larger than a human head. Some of the fish seemed timid around the duo, others were clearly more courageous than the rest, coming out of the kelp and the deeps to investigate these strange new creatures.

Weiss seemed surprisingly okay with these creatures, probably because none of them were the same size as she was. Looking around, Yang could see several distinct fish, the most exotic of which looked like a blue lizard with six large rounded legs and no tail. These ones whizzed around through the kelp with grace, speed, and confidence – even if they kept a bit away from the interlopers. Another species, this one colored neon green and vibrant violet, seemed more curious than most, swimming right up towards Weiss. Why they were all so interested in Weiss was beyond Yang's knowledge, maybe she just oozed fear and timidity so much that even the fish could tell? Whatever, point was the Schnee was finally getting a good impression of this planet, for better or for worse.

It was for worse, naturally. Having lowered her guard, Yang didn't notice a small fish sneaking up behind Weiss – but the other fish in the area sure did and began to back away and take evasive measures like swimming more erratically or simply swimming away at speed. That was what clued Yang in, albeit too late to stop what happened next. As Weiss reached out towards the fish with the hoops as it started to back away, there was a sudden cackling sound and then something was attached to Weiss' arm and she was shrieking incoherently and thrashing in an ultimately vain attempt to get it off of her. Several other creatures of the same type were now swimming towards the thrashing woman, to which Yang responded by pulling her last knife and attacking them indiscriminately. Successfully killing most of them, one managed to grab hold of Yangs arm, and bit down. It was to Yangs horror that the bastard fish began to suck out her blood – she swiftly impaled it on the knife and tore it off, before finally rushing over to where Weiss was.

Weiss was still thrashing helplessly as the large sack on the 'head' of the bloodsucking creature began to bloat. As Yang arrived, she took a foot the face and tried to calm Weiss down – to no avail. Forced by Weiss' own thrashing to stay away, Yang could only watch as the bloodsucker continued to feed until full, before letting go and sluggishly meandering off a little. Using her knife to kill the little bastard, Yang turned towards Wiess. The Schnee was holding her slightly bleeding forearm, curled around it while beginning to hyperventilate. Yang rushed over tried to calm her again now that the threat was gone.

"Weiss, it's gone, it's gone, you're safe now. Breath in, brea-"

"Surface… *gasp* Now…"

Yang didn't argue, knowing that at this point there would be no arguing with the woman or reasoning with her either. As they reached the surface, they found that they could, if they strained a little, see their destination. Weiss threw a weak but confidant glare at Yang, and the two swam with no small amount of speed toward their destination. Upon reaching it, Yang waited for Weiss to enter before doing so herself…

Dove was beyond words. Not only had his desperate cry for help been answered, but it had been answered by no less than four people! They had come in pairs, with the first pair consisting of a bombshell blonde with muscles and experience alongside the white-haired Weiss Schnee – the owner of the Beacon and the head of the Phasegate project herself! Granted, Ms. Schnee seemed utterly useless, but even so, she was rich and powerful, if somewhat injured. The woman, however, was useful, using her limited knowledge of medicine and her formidable experience from years of mercenary work to get Blake's breathing stabilized and strong again.

It was about when Yang had claimed to be unable to do anything more for the injured biologist that the hatch opened again, revealing a woman with orange hair and a wicked grin. She hauled herself up to reveal that she was physically more imposing even than Yang (who had far from insignificant muscles herself). The lifepod was built for two people to use comforitably, and managed four with some difficulty, but with five it became unworkable – he and Nora left the pod, though not before Nora stated her friend had some experience with medicine. Dove was now sitting on top of the pod with Nora, the top hatch open as he listened to his room mate the reporter explain to Yang how he'd managed to put Blake's lungs back the way they were meant to be.

Somehow it was only midday, it had felt like a week had passed since they landed. Stress would do that, Dove supposed, but even so… The Schnee Heiress was sleeping off the stress of the day and Dove honestly felt like joining her. For now, though, Dove was talking to Nora and listening to the tale she had to tell about her trip to his lifepod. Dove di not want to go near the water ever again knowing such monsters existed, but that was a problem for some other time. For now, rest and waiting until everyone was recovered enough to talk meant he didn't need to worry about the water.

Okay so not a huge amount larger, but that's because I decided to split Sky and Ruby's trip to the lifepod off from the rest of them. Yeah, part 1 of Sky & Ruby was literally 1000 words long, and since I'm not going to be able to 6-7 thousand word chapters I'm not even going to grace you with a single one of them. Despite removing them we still stand at over 3k words for this chapter, which is about 500 more than usual. We didn't cover as many biomes as I wanted, because I looked at the Subnautica map and realized that the Crag Fields was too far from the Aurora for Jaune & Nora to have fled there from the leviathan. Ah well, I'm not too upset with the chapter. The ending isn't quite which I wanted, but it's close enough for now. May be edited a bit at a later date when I'm better at writing and can do a better job on it.

Now then, I forgot to reply to review last chapter! El Gaspe! Here's some belated replies for the lot of you:

Mattianabbone99 - Glad you enjoyed it, I cackled deviously while writing it myself :) I always find it a bit more fun to write (and read) tragedies and the like, I'm just messed up like that. The native life of Planet 4546B is absolutely nightmarish. Go to the SubNautica wiki some time, check out the comparisons - even 'small' fish like Peepers are literally the size of a persons head. The Sandsharks' dorsal fin is literally as tall as a grown man, it's terrifying. Why is everything so big?! lol

Raptoex (Ch2)- I can make no promises on the Kharaa/Carar (nobody seems to agree on the spelling anymore lol) but at least one person will survive to the end, that I can assure you of. Glad to know that isn't enough to scare you off :D

failed to load - Yeah, keep in mind that this is all still Day 1 for our survivors. The plot won't really begin until Day 2, which should be around Ch6 or 7, depending on how my fingers decide to type up the specific details. As for the planet, well, heh, I gotta say the natives of 4546B could probably give the Grimm a run for their money in terms of threat level and power.

CIPC - I have no intentions of abandoning this (or my other fictions). The only reason there would be delays on this is if I get writers block or don't have internet access. Glad you enjoyed it :D

Guest - Thanks and will do :)

Raptorex (Ch3)- Yeah, Ruby & Sky really got blown away there. Their pod is equitable to the pod that can be found in the Blood Kelp already, but theirs hit the bottom before they escaped. Lucky Ruby can built pretty much anything.

And now, to conclude, a scrapped add-on that I was going to include for Yang & Weiss (and the story overall). In the trailer (the teaser trailer) there are two types of avian life: Skyrays and 'Long Rays' the latter of which never made the game itself (not yet at least). I was gonna include them as a predatory species of avian, but dropped it for purposes of sticking to confirmed cannon only. Here's the dropped attack, which was the original reason Yang & Weiss went back down underwater when entering the Kelp Forest:

The two started swimming at the surface, heading towards the lifepod beacon superimposed upon their masks, and began to calm down. Nothing was attacking from the sky, not that Yang could see at least, and nothing seemed to be interested in getting too close to the surface from below either. It was almost peaceful, if not for the constant waves and the effort needed to swim. Naturally, that peace was suddenly broken as a large, thin, beak as long as grown mans arm dove into the water, just barely missing Yang as she swam. The monster creature started to head back to the surface itself, having only been able to plunge meter or two down before it stopped. On the way back up, both Weiss and Yang were gifted with a first-hand look at the monster.

The monster was like a snake with a pair of massive, if narrow, wings. The body was pale white in color, thin enough that it probably couldn't be seen from the water unless one was actively looking for it and went from rounded in the front to flattened for about 5/6th of the body. The equally thin wings were each as long as the body itself and were smooth and with thin bones through them – they looked like fish fins, but longer and thinner. The head consisted of a pair of downward facing eyes that began to extend on two short stalks. The stalks themselves protruded from the base of the flying predator's beak, which was about a meter long and had a series of inward-facing spikes forming three rows pointing towards the gullet of the monster. The edges of the beak were thick and heavy looking, as if designed to crush through bone and flesh alike.

Yang didn't give it time to attack them again, instead grabbing Weiss and dropping down deeper into the water, getting them at least six meters below the surface before calming enough to look back up and watch the predatory avian struggle to get airborn again. Shivering as they realized how close each of them had just come to losing a limb, the two women found themselves in what could only be described as a kelp forest. Massive clumps of greenery surrounded them even this close to the surface, and extended downward into the murky deeps of the region they were in. Everything was green and brown with teal interspersed due to the water itself.

I'm not going to add any NEW creatures to the story, but I may make small modifications to the behaviors of existing creatures for reasons of drama, plot, or because I think it's more fitting. If/when I make such changes I'll note it and probably explain my reasoning on the subject.

For now, cya'll next time!

~TRP