Hello everyone, hopefully those of you who were interested in this story haven't forgotten about it after all of this time. I know it's been a very long time since I actually updated this(two years if I'm not mistaken), and I'd like to explain why, as well as my plans for the future.

First and foremost, I apologize for the absurdly long delay in updates. I've been debating if I even wanted to post this update because I didn't want to get people's hopes up with a notification only for it to be an announcement, but ultimately I decided that this was necessary.

Now that that's out of the way, let's get into the details. The reason I haven't updated this in so long is because I uploaded this story far earlier than I ever should have, to be perfectly honest. I was in no way shape or form prepared for the endeavor this would be at the time, and I really jumped the gun as far as posting this went, especially since I had three other stories going at the time.

As you can no doubt tell by the title, Survival Instinct is the second book in a series of stories I've been writing for several years now. The other three; Perdition's Genesis, Shattered Reality, and In Noctem, were stories that I was either already writing or had planned even before this one, and the decision to have Survival Instinct be listed as the second book was made to keep everything in chronological order, which will help me explain this next bit a little better.

Some time ago I decided that I wasn't happy with the quality of my stories and decided to take a break from Survival Instinct and In Noctem to do a complete overhaul on the ones that began this entire endeavor(Book 1: Perdition's Genesis, and Book 3: Shattered Reality), which is a decision I still stand by, as they have since become much better. However, due to circumstances outside of my control, as well as other obligations and things happening in real life(including but not limited to having a job and being a full-time college student), this process has taken significantly longer than I ever planned, and for that I am sorry.

Perdition's Genesis is 100% complete and has been for some time now. Shattered Reality is still a work in progress, but I'm now making quick progress on it and I hope to have it done within a few months, hopefully before summer comes around. After that's finally over, I will return to writing Survival Instinct and it'll have my full focus as far as my writing goes. I'll be revising the first two chapters of this story too, but thankfully I only got two deep before this long hiatus so they shouldn't take too long to fix up. As for Book 4: In Noctem, don't worry about that getting in the way. That one is yet another story that I published far too soon, and I've already announced its hiatus and that I'll only return to it after everything else is complete.

Now, don't think that just because I haven't updated this in a very long time I don't know where I'm going with it. All of this time hasn't gone to waste, as I've come up with a full plan of the entire story, as well as pages upon pages of notes on what I want to do with it. I have everything mapped out, so now all that's left is to finish my prior obligations and then get back to working on this!

Finally, I figured I'd let you in on what's coming next since I've kept you all waiting for so long. Chapter 3 begins with Ben waking up on the floor after SCP-173's attack. He's scared and confused, but unharmed. Marcus(whose name I've changed to Andre) finds him and they discuss what happened. Neither of them think that Ben actually died considering he's standing right there, but any of you who are familiar with the Spiral Gestalt theory will know what's really going on. Throughout the chapter, they wander the facility, encountering more people and anomalies, the most significant of which is SCP-079, which I've moved to the Light Containment Zone. 079 is going to have a much larger role in this story than it ever did in Containment Breach, acting as sort of a VEGA/GLaDOS type of character who eventually forms a reluctant alliance with Ben so that they can both escape, which is why I'm introducing it so early in the story. Something important to note is that the facility layout isn't like the layout from Containment Breach. It's roughly based on the late SCP Unity's(which, believe it or not, is a project I was actually involved with before its project lead shut it down) layout in that the Light Containment Zone is in the middle of the facility, Heavy Containment is deep beneath the LCZ, and the Logistics Department(based on Containment Breach's Entrance Zone) will be far above the LCZ. There will be a Central Lift(similar to Unity's Core Room) connecting the three zones with elevators, and different areas on each level of the facility are connected by the Central Lift. For example, on the LCZ floor, Ben is able to access the four different Sectors of the Light Containment Zone from the Central Lift, but to do so he must get past the Tesla Gates and Decontamination Checkpoints located between the lift and the individual sectors, all while avoiding things that want to kill him.

To simplify; Area 37's layout is based on the facility layout of SCP Unity, while the story and lore is inspired by SCP Containment Breach, with all sorts of my own plans and ideas mixed in. Keep in mind that all of this is only the tip of the iceberg. This all might sound a bit confusing now, but trust that I have a plan and that it'll make perfect sense within the story. I'm going to see this project through to its very end, you have my word on that.

I believe that covers just about everything. If you have any questions, feel free to leave them in the comments. I'd be happy to answer. Once again, thank you for taking the time to read this, and I hope to be seeing you all again real soon.