Dododex

ARK: Survival Evolved & Ascended Companion

Journey Through All Creatures

Chapter 44: The Depths of Aberration

Note: Story starts in Achatina, The Island ABC order for Section I, Scorched Earth Exclusives and Aberration Exclusives for Section II and has a Prologue. Last chapter in Karkinos, next chapter in Ravager.

Chapters to the end of Section II: 6

Cave Chapters: Aberration: Chapter 1/3: The Depths of the Railway Cave

Aberration Day 4

Close to noon…

Dorack groaned quietly as he slowly opened his eyes. He was lying on a bed inside of his base. He groaned as he began to yawn. He sighed then got up, and when he rubbed his eyes, he saw Sodden sitting on the bed next to him, holding a longneck rifle with a tranq dart inside it. Dorack turned his head to him.

“Give me one reason why I shouldn’t knock you out again.” Sodden said, clearly full of anger. Dorack sighed.

“Okay, listen, it’s not what you think. Marison just tricked us. He lied. How can you believe him? He’s part of Rod’s horrible tribe.” Dorack said. Sodden scoffed.

“Yeah, okay. Well, then explain why you ran away to some random tribe’s base without telling me!” Sodden yelled. He threw the longneck rifle on the ground. Dorack sighed.

“I… I mean… I was trying to get into the Aberration Kingdom to-” Dorack said, then Sodden interrupted him.

“Oh, of course this is about that stupid lie! You need to… you know what? Forget it. I don’t care where you went, I want to know why you went there.” Sodden said sternly.

“Well… I wanted Rock Drakes. So we could get resources faster.” Dorack said. Sodden sighed.

“Why is rushing everything suddenly so important to you?” Sodden growled. Dorack stammered.

“Uh… so we could find out how to get Nal back…” Dorack said. Sodden’s jaw dropped.

“Oh, of course. Of course this is about her. Listen, can you just… I’m very sad. You wanna know why? You’re being a pretty bad friend. We’ve been very chill this entire journey, and now you’re just fighting me? Nal is gone for good. You need to move on. You’re pretty stupid. Did you not see the gold message?” Sodden said. Dorack stood up.

“Look, I don’t wanna fight with you. You’re right. I’m being kinda rude. I have an idea. The first cave is at around the southwestern end of the Mushroom Forest. We have the right resources to do the cave. We can take grapples and climbing picks and…” Dorack said, then Sodden interrupted.

“Okay, hold on. Why do we need to rush caves? Like, I’m pretty sure I heard that these caves were hard. Like, pretty hard. We would need a ravager to do the first cave. It’s not like we can find one soon.” Sodden said. Dorack nodded slowly, then gasped. He walked to the door. “I have an idea. You can go find some ravagers to tame, while I prepare resources for the cave.” Dorack said. Sodden walked to the door.

“Okay, but you cannot leave the base without telling me, okay? And forget the Aberration Kingdom, it’s just a stupid crap story (Note: This is false I love the story).” Sodden said loudly, then stormed out the door with his bag, which had taming stuff in it. Dorack closed the door and walked to his bed, then sat down and sighed.

“How can I tell him that Nal’s still here without even knowing how to get her back? I need to do something. Just gotta hope the Aberration Kingdom heard of my presence and decided to look for us. Okay…” Dorack sighed and collapsed onto his bed.

Meanwhile…

Marison gripped a sword tightly as he stormed down some stairs. The stairs were all metal, and the basement below had many large cells in it. Marison stormed through the hall, and looked around after a few seconds.

“Dread, you said you wanted to meet me here!” Marison yelled. Then he heard a deep voice from the ceiling.

“Of course I did. I need to tell you something…” Dread growled in a deep, booming voice. He leaped down from the ceiling, slamming into the ground with his feet. It shook the area around him.

“Marison, I appreciate your effort to try and turn Sodden against Dorack. I know you are trying to help this plan. But you almost died that one time you encountered him. And I know exactly why. Marison. Show me her cell.” Dread growled. Marison stammered. “But… boss…” Marison stammered.

“NOW!!!” Dread boomed. Marison yelped and ran to the south, and Dread followed him. Marison ran towards a dim area, where there was nothing but rocks and large metal cells in the walls. Then Marison turned to one of the cells near the end of the hallway. Someone turned around and gasped.

“Here she is.” Marison said. Dread grinned.

“Oh, yes. Well… you up for a chat, Serenity?” Dread growled. Serenity gasped and backed away, gasping quietly.

“You know what happens when you defy my orders, right?” Dread growled. Serenity was shaking hard, gasping quietly, as she slowly walked towards the door.

“Listen up. Remember the deal. If anything happens that blows our cover, if our base gets compromised, if anyone tries to intervene with anything and anyone in this tribe… if your stupid friends screw everything up… well, you’d better hope they don’t. Because if they manage to free Nal and breach our plan, you… you are going to the Reaper. Nothing is going to stop us from doing this. You’re lucky you got released from that machine thing. You can walk around freely as long as everything goes right. Marison! Go to the Transcender now to check on Nal.” Dread yelled. Marison nodded and walked the opposite direction, towards a door that had multiple locks on it, had a force field around it, and had a alarm above its frame. The alarm would go off every time someone who wasn’t part of the tribe opened the door. Terad once entered the door and it almost cost him and Serenity their lives.

“No… what is going on?” Serenity whispered, gasping quietly and quickly. Tears began to appear in her eyes as she sat down, and put her head down in between her legs.

“Rod’s coming to talk with you next week. We might move you to the upper floor of the dungeon if all goes well with this plan. And when Sodden goes back to the Island, Nal’s essence decays in 12 days, and Dorack is disposed of for good, well, you can just sit here and rot. Oh, one more thing.” Dread said. Serenity sniffled as she looked up slowly to the cell door. “Since you haven’t seen Sodden for a second in this godforsaken Arc that gets over 3 months of polar day and 3 months of extreme cold from the forever night on the stupid f… wait. What was I going to say? Oh, right. You get 30 minutes to chat with Sodden right now. But you are going straight to the Reaper if you mention anything, ANYTHING about our plan!!” Dread yelled. Serenity gasped.

“Oh, and if you say anything about our location… Reaper time for you instantly. And we will raid them immediately. I know Sodden. He progresses too damn fast. That stupid Nudon… we had to take care of the two people. I knew Sodden was going to be the toughest to break down. So was Dorack. You were just too easy to handle because of your former ally, Marison. We had to handle Nal next. Dorack and Sodden may be friends on the Island and Scorched Earth… but here, everyone’s an enemy. And me and the Rock Death tribe will always make sure of that.” Dread sneered. Serenity stood up and walked to the cell door. Dread took a small orb out of his bag, which was glowing purplish-orange, and had a light blue flame inside of it. It was small. Dread slipped it through the force field that stood on the cell door, which would only allow people part of the tribe to interact with it. Serenity took it.

“You’d better hurry if you wanna chat with him.” Dread sneered. He then made a hand gesture telling Serenity that he would be watching her the whole time. Then Dread stormed away, sending a message to Marison. Serenity sighed and walked to the right corner of the room, where there was a hard, flat, cold rocky bed. There was no soft mattress, no blanket, and the pillow was a hard, cold rock that glowed red. Serenity sat down on the bed and put the orb inside of her implant, where there was a small hole right below the singularity, the center of a survivor’s implant. The orb would allow communication with any survivor, regardless of their tribe, as long as they were on the same Ark. It would decompose after 30 minutes, so Serenity had to be quick. The orb entered her implant and it glowed bright green, then a message showed up above the green mist that emitted from the singularity.

“Who would you like to talk to” the message said. Serenity sighed and said, “Sodden. Spawn date, October 24, 2024, current Ark, Aberration. Level unknown because that b—- Dread captured me before I could meet him.” Serenity said. The message then dissolved and the green mist turned metallic purple, and then she heard a voice.

“Survivor detected.”

Serenity gasped.

Back in the Mushroom Forest…

Sodden had constructed a small stone trap, a 2 by 2 foundation layout with 2 walls on top of each other on each edge. Sodden put ramps down on the front for the ravager to come in through, and there was a window on the back for Sodden to shoot the ravager through. Sodden sat on a rock, looking around the area with his spyglass, then he saw a ravager and gasped. It was a Level 135. Just perfect. Sodden put the spyglass in his bag and jumped off the rock, then took out a crossbow, loaded an arrow onto it, and walked towards the Ravager. The ravager was alone, which was good. Sodden then shot it and the ravager roared and began to gallop towards Sodden. Sodden ran to the back of the trap, where the Ravager ran up the ramps, then fell into the trap. Sodden chuckled and loaded a tranq arrow on his crossbow. He looked through the window, and the ravager was screeching as it was gnawing on a wall on the opposite end of the trap. Sodden held up his crossbow and shot the arrow. It pierced the ravager in its butt, and it roared and ran at the window. Sodden backed up as the ravager began biting the windows, and Sodden took more tranq arrows out of his bag, loaded one, and shot it at the ravager. He continued shooting down the ravager until it began to run in the opposite direction. It jumped around, trying to use its claws to get out, but its efforts were futile. Soon, the final arrow pierced the ravager in the leg, and it fell over, unconscious. Sodden sighed and walked towards the river nearby to kill some Spinos for prime meat. He sat atop a cliff hanging above a river, around 10 meters below. Sodden took his crossbow and loaded a normal arrow onto it. He pulled back the string with the arrow, and then put his finger on the trigger. He aimed for a spino that was roaming the cliffside across the river. Then he got a alert on his implant. His implant was flashing purple. Sodden put the crossbow down and looked at his implant. He sat down and tapped it, then he saw a bright light shine from the singularity inside of his implant. Sodden looked away, then turned back around after a few seconds to hear a voice.

“You… you there? You doing good, bro?” The voice said. Sodden gasped. He recognized the voice.

“What? Bro… how are you even… I don’t…” Sodden stammered.

“Dread decided to give me a device to contact you for 30 minutes. He said I can’t give out details on his plan, or tell you my location or anything. I want to know how you’re doing.” Serenity said.

“Well… I’m doing alright. Super tired since I chased Dorack across the map last night to find out he was hanging around someone’s base. Kept lying about that made up story called the Queen of Aberration, saying that the Aberration Kingdom was real or something…” Sodden said. Serenity groaned.

“You cannot be serious. The Aberration Kingdom does exist. If Dorack was there… was anyone else there?” Serenity said.

“Well, I did see Marison, who lied about where Dorack was.” Sodden said. Serenity gasped.

“What? You do remember what happened the last time Dorack encountered Marison, right?” Serenity said concerningly. Sodden sighed.

“Yeah, kinda.” Sodden said.

“Marison told us about it. Came into the base late at night. He was critically wounded. He even admitted to seeing the Creator! Which means Dorack somehow almost killed him. Problem? It almost cost the lives of Dorack and Reaper.” Serenity said. Sodden gasped.

“What? Why didn’t Dorack tell me this? His recklessness almost gets Reaper killed, and I’m seriously hearing this now?” Sodden said. Serenity stammered.

“Well, I can’t say what the plan is. But here’s the thing. Something is going on, and you need to make sure Dorack stays under control. Be nice to him. You’re… you’re not planning on caves, soon, are you?” Serenity asked.

“Uh… well… me and Dorack are going to take on the Artifact of the Depths later today.” Sodden said. Serenity nodded slowly and looked around the area.

“Okay, that’s a safe cave. I heard that some of Dread’s minions are going to go mining in the Hidden Grotto tomorrow. Just stay away from that cave for a few days and you’ll be fine.” Serenity said. Sodden nodded.

“Yeah… well… Dorack keeps trying to rush things. I don’t like that. It just puts us in more danger. Eventually, someone’s gonna get killed and things are going to get heated. All we need to do is just… just slow down. Move on from everything that’s happened and just try and get out of here.” Sodden said. Serenity was silent. She then yelled in anger.

“Sodden, do you even realize what the heck is going on here? Dread isn’t some stupid idiot that doesn’t know how to do horrible things. He has been in many different Arks, he’s captured many different people, and he’s killed many different survivors and creatures! He… he is not to be underestimated. Do you know what happened the last time I was here? Well, maybe yeah, since I told you, but you weren’t there. You don’t have the true vision of what exactly happened. Rod was the one to capture me. Dread killed 8 people from our tribe and almost killed Terad himself. I almost died multtiple times last time AND also had a Reaper inside my body. I even saw Dread legitimately crush someone’s implant with their bare hands. He has unimaginable strength, Sodden. He knows you and Dorack. That’s not just because of Rod, but also because of the fact that Dread is very much against our tribe and wants to control the Assassin Heart himself. Trust Dorack and please don’t fight him again. And please, for the love of heck, stay away from Marison. Dorack killed his friend permanently and Marison definitely wants revenge. His Megalosaurs almost killed Reaper and Dorack. I get that you’re trying to control Dorack, but please don’t rush too much. Don’t underestimate these people again. I… I loved going on this journey. I was able to be free during this journey. But now, we have to lay low. For both our protection.” Serenity said. Sodden nodded slowly and gasped softly.

“What do you mean, “we”?” Sodden asked.

“Well…you wouldn’t have gotten here if it wasn’t for me, right?” Serenity asked.

“Yeah.” Sodden said.

“Sodden… trust me that Nal is still alive. She may not have long left, but if Dorack pushes too much, the consequences could be fatal to every single one of us. I don’t wanna lose everything. I don’t wanna lose you.” Serenity said quietly. Sodden sniffled quietly.

“I like you too. I don’t wanna lose you…” Sodden said. Then they heard loud, fast footsteps, as if someone was storming down the stairs and the hall.

“Oh, crap. That’s Dread, isn’t it?” Sodden said. Serenity gasped and looked up at the cell door. Then someone stormed to the door and shattered the lock. Serenity gasped and backed up to against the corner of the wall.

“I knew you two would be too good together. Good choice to split you two up. Anyway…” Dread growled. Then he grabbed Serenity’s arm and yanked her off the bed, and dragged her across the floor. She screamed in pain, trying to punch Dread’s arm to get out. Sodden stood up and gasped.

“No. NO!!” Sodden yelled in worrysomeness. Serenity kept screaming as Dread threw her against the wall. Dread then grabbed her by the neck and took a syringe out of his bag. Serenity kept struggling to get out. Dread then lunged the syringe into Serenity’s implant, hard. She screamed in pain as blood spurted from her arm. The purple glow on Sodden’s implant then dissolved. Sodden gasped and fell down on his knees, shocked. Serenity’s implant then glowed red as the purple orb then cracked and shot up from the implant and exploded. The blast was minor, but the damage to Serenity’s implant was not.

“Can’t you just f—-ing cooperate, —--?” Dread screamed in anger. He then stormed to the south end of the hall, where there was a dark cell at the end. In it was some stairs leading deep underground. Then Dread burst the door open and stomped down the stairs. At the bottom was a rocky room, with only a hard, rocky surface, no bed, no pillow, no blanket, and the water valve on the other end was tiny, only giving a few drops of water a day. Dread threw Serenity against the wall. Serenity groaned and tried to stand up, gasping, tears forming in her eyes.

“Hope you enjoy one narcoberry per day. You should be lucky you didn’t get thrown into the pit with the Reaper. Well, anyway, time for me to go.” Dread sneered. He turned around to the door and opened it, then slammed it and locked it.

“NO!! No…” Serenity screamed, still in deep pain. Then the door upstairs slammed shut, leaving no light in the room at all.

Later that day…

Dorack sat outside of the base, on the front porch of the house. He looked around, hoping that Sodden would get back soon. Then he saw Sodden riding on a Ravager towards the base. Sodden was silent and looking down. Dorack stood up and gasped as he saw Sodden coming.

“Hey, dude! You have the Ravager, I see. I have the supplies ready.” Dorack called out. Sodden nodded slowly.

“Good to know.” Sodden said as he stopped just outside of the base.

“Well, we have no other usable cryopods, so we’ll just have to leave the Ravager outside the base.” Dorack said. Sodden nodded and the two walked into the base to collect the remaining supplies.

Later…

The two survivors were riding their Ravager west, towards the far end of the Mushroom Forest to find the old railway cave. As they trudged through bushes, around tall and thick trees, and throughout mushroom fields, trying to avoid the dangerous ones, Sodden kept his head down most of the way. He couldn’t help but think about what had just gone down. How was he going to beat all the caves, get the artifacts, get the resources, and find a way to free their two missing friends in just less than two weeks? Then the Ravager roared and ran forward, and Sodden shot his head up and grabbed onto the fur of the creature as it ran forward, along with Dorack, whose Ravager was running fast too. Dorack sighed and slowed down his creatures, then turned around to Sodden.

“Bro… something wrong? I whistled the ravagers to run forward because I saw that we were approaching a mushroom patch.” Dorack said. Sodden sighed.

“Nah, nothing’s wrong. I’m fine, let’s just… let’s just keep going.” Sodden said. The two were approaching a river, where in the far distance there was a bend surrounded by cliffsides. The two survivors continued down the river until they approached the bend, where they saw a large, grassy opening in one of the cliffsides. There were large crystal shards poking out of the ceiling and walls, and the ground was rough and green, with many rocks scattered across. The ground was slightly damp and moist, and there were no creatures in sight. The two survivors, along with their creatures, approached the cave entrance.

“Well, we’re here. Okay, so I have a shotgun from Nal’s bag, so you can use my shotgun.” Dorack said. Sodden turned to him and nodded. Dorack reached into his bag, then pulled a shotgun out of it, then tossed it to Sodden. Sodden caught it then whistled for the ravagers to continue through the cave. The creatures trotted through the cave until they reached the narrow opening just ahead of the entrance and around a bend. The opening was small and had a low ceiling, so the creatures couldn’t fit in there.

“Uh… okay. We’ll have to use cryopods.” Sodden said.

“The only cryopod I have is that cryopod with the low level raptor. I’ll use it to transfer both creatures to the other side.” Dorack said. He reached for his bag, then his arm stopped. Dorack sighed and took the cryopod out.

“Uh… you know what? I think this ravager can hold both of us.” Dorack said. Sodden turned to him.

“Uh… okay. Go ahead.” Sodden said. He got off his ravager, then Dorack got off his and put that ravager in the cryopod. Then both survivors crouched down and crept through the small opening. Then they rose from the opening, looking down at the slope that went down through the cave, making turns occasionally. Dorack threw the ravager back out, then both survivors got on it, with their shotguns ready, and continued down the tunnel. As they continued through the cave, they could see bright mushrooms speckled across the walls, light-green grass all across the ground, and small puddles deep in the cave. There were pulmonoscorpiuses and carnos nearby, along with a megalosaur. As the two survivors rounded the bend, they aimed their shotguns at the creatures, and shot them down quickly before they could come over. They were all low levels, so they died easily. The two survivors continued down through the tunnels, jumping across cliffs and shooting down any cave creatures that came their way.

After some time, they reached a large chamber, where there was a large metal platform sticking out of the wall. At the other end of it was a thin, horizontal pole, and hovering above it was the artifact container.. Sodden got off the ravager as they approached, then he walked to the container standing tall on the horizontal pole and then grunted as he pushed the lid off the container, then lifted the artifact out of the container. They had secured the first artifact.

“Okay. One artifact down, two to go!” Dorack said. Sodden nodded and put the artifact in his bag, then he got back on the Ravager and the two survivors went to leave the cave, going through any creatures that got in their way.

Meanwhile, somewhere in the Red Zone…

Marison was standing in a large, crystal-purple room, and there was a strange, metal machine in the center. There was a egg-shaped pod in it, along with some strange machines that seemed to be powering it with essence. Marison stared at the machine for a while, then Dread stormed in.

“What do you want?” Marison asked. Dread sighed.

“I saw some of Queen Syl’s rock drakes and warriors marching out into the Blue Zone earlier today. She’s trying to find Sodden and Dorack.” Dread growled. Marison gasped.

“Of course. Well… we gotta stop them. Get the Reaper platoon. We’re going now.” Marison said. Dread chuckled.

“I’ll let you prepare them yourself, since you’re so loyal. Besides, I need to talk to… someone.” Dread sneered. Marison ran through the halls towards the stairs to the first floor. Dread walked towards the other end of the hall, went through the metal door and walked down the bruised and broken stairs. Serenity turned around quickly and gasped as she heard footsteps.

“We need to talk. Now.” Dread sneered as he reached the ground and walked towards Serenity, who was sitting down, gasping as she leaned against the corner of the wall.

Dread yanked a club out of his bag and chuckled.

“You’d better stay chill down here or facing the Reaper will be the last thiing you do.” Dread growled.

To be continued…

63 days and it’s finally here! Sorry if it was barely anything related to the cave; I couldn’t think of much to write. Anyway, for real this time, the next few chapters will come out VERY, VERY soon!

-RelatingHen8906