Subnautica - Cave of Secrets

Cave of Secrets - Part 3

After passing through the rec fields, Riley entered a biome he quickly dubbed the brush forest. "Wow," he said, awestruck. Fruit trees were everywhere, from gel sacks and marble melons to lemon berry and bobo plant and everything in between. In the center stood a giant plant that Riley immediately dubbed the tree of delight. It was a giant Preston's delight plant with regular sized Preston's delights. There were tons of fruit on the tree.

"Given my knowledge of giant trees on this planet," Riley muttered to himself, "the entrance to the fire and ice cave should be right..." immediately below him he spotted a giant hole, "...there," he finished. He equipped his torpedo bay with gas torpedoes and slowly started in. He immediately backed out remembering the modules he had equipped. He quickly swapped in the heat resistance and ice repellent modules and, satisfied, started back into the hole. Icicles were hanging above lava pools, and lava lizards were crawling along the snow.

"The Yin Yang alien artifact should be here, somewhere, Riley said to himself. No, I need to focus, he thought, and moved on. Eventually he saw the Precursor pillars he was looking for. "I knew that must be where I'd find the red tablet," he said. Guarding it however had to be, and indeed was, both the sea dragon and the ice dragon.

Equipping his torpedoes, Riley moved closer. Suddenly, the sea moth's emergency detection system started screaming and Riley saw the fireballs just in time. Dodging them with centimeters to spare, he glanced down at his radar to see the ice dragon approaching behind him.

"The fireballs were just distraction!" Riley shouted. Knowing that the ice dragon would swallow his vehicle whole, with him inside it, he started to panic. "No," he told himself, "get it together." Riley knew the fight that was in front of him, and he knew he needed all of his wits to get out of it alive. The luxury of fear would have to wait. Riley darted behind a massive rock formation but he knew it he had only bought himself a few seconds. Equipping a warp torpedo, he waited for the ice dragon to come around the corner and unloaded both tubes, hitting it square in the face. The ice dragon teleported away, but he knew the effect was only temporary.

Riley activated his speed upgrade and darted into the ring of pillars. "There it is!" He shouted. Riley felt a swell of hope in his chest as he was just moments away from his target. "Oh no," Riley said, his hope turning to dread as a fire dragon rose to appear between him and the tablet. As the fire dragon started shooting fireballs, Riley was able to dodge them but the speed boost meant he was moving too fast for full evasive maneuvers. Riley yanked on the controls, arms screaming from effort, as he tried to get away from the monster, but it was no use. The fire dragon reached out with his T-Rex arms and grabbed the vehicle, immediately moving it towards his mouth. Thinking fast, Riley switched to gas torpedoes and shot one into the dragon's mouth. The poison from the torpedoes was enough to distract the fire dragon, giving him just enough time to redirect emergency power to his thrusters and burst away to freedom.

Riley had only a split second to decide whether to escape to safety or try again for the red tablet. "No guts, no glory, I suppose," he murmured to himself, "I came down her for the red tablet, and I'm not leaving without it!"

As he steered the sea moth back around to where the red tablet lay, Riley knew his margin for error was slim to none. When he reached the tablet he jumped out, grabbed it, and shoved it into his storage module. He jumped back into the sea moth and punched in the commands that would rocket him to safety. As he looked up, his blood ran cold, and he knew he had made a fatal mistake. Just ahead of him was where the ice dragon had been teleported to. Before Riley could move or even think, the ice dragon spit its ice right at him and his ship was frozen solid. He tried to jiggle the handle of the sea moth but it wouldn't budge. He was trapped.

At this very moment, the fire dragon, having cleared itself of the poison from the gas torpedoes, came looking for revenge. It shot several fireballs at the ship, melting the ice and giving Riley a chance to dart away. As he escaped, Riley heard a frustrated roar and looked back to see the two monsters locked in battle. With shaking hands, Riley punched in the coordinates of Maida's base and allowed himself a wry smile. "Who ever could have known that a fire dragon would come in handy?"

Riley's HUD started chiming. He flipped it on to see Maida staring back at him.

"You find that thing yet?" She demanded.

"Maybe you could have not tampered with my ice resistance module?" Riley said viciously.

"I'll take that as a yes," Maida replied.

Riley sighed loudly, trying to calm himself. Getting into a fight at this point wouldn't do anyone any good.

"Yes." He hoped he sounder calmer than he felt. "Let's just say that no matter what the sea moth goes through, those reaper mandibles will not come off."

"I think it adds a sort of je ne sais quoi," Sam chimed in from the background.

"Listen you two," Riley began, "there's a huge tree of Preston's delight, do you want me to grab some on my way back?"

"We're almost out here, so that would be nice," Maida replied.

"I was being sarcastic," Riley muttered.

"What's that?" Said Maida.

"I said, sure, I'll grab some" replied Riley with a roll of his eyes. "There are some weird fish around it that I dubbed ion fish. I'll grab a few of those as well, maybe Sam can inspect them.

"I'd appreciate that," Sam's voice said from off-screen.

Maida's annoyed voice breaks in, "Aren't these things supposed to be soundproof?"

"Yeah, I tampered with it," said Sam's voice.

Riley choked back a laugh. "Listen, I'm coming up on the rec fields now. I'll be there in about five minutes. I'll check in later," he said, and promptly hung up before he got caught in the middle of the argument that was brewing between the two women. I wonder if there's a way to make my voice sound more human, Riley thought to himself. He sighed as he set a course to the Preston's delight tree. What a bunch we are, he said himself.