Flash Slug


The Flash Slug is a lifeform found around the Overgrown Ruins, Karakorum Power Plant, and Root Canyon areas. It is a source of Isotonic Water when combined with Salt in a Fabricator. It provides +20 Food and -10 Health when consumed. The Digestion adaptation is required to safely consume alien lifeforms. A player without this adaptation will not receive its effect and be deducted health.

Appearance

The flash slug has a flat, purple ray-like body with a pair of wide fins that turn into a pale, grey, cyan.

Their secondary pair of fins, located at the back of their bodies, resembles the wings of a swallowtail butterfly, and shares the same colouration of the main fins.

The slug possesses a smooth, purple, beak-like mouth at the front, with 2 eye stalks tipped with yellow iris eyes.

The most notable feature of the flash slug is large transparent bulb covering the top of its body, leaving only the fins, mouth, & eyes exposed.

This transparent bulb contains an opaque blue brain-shaped organ, with vertical ridges across the sides, and a smooth leaf-vein like top.

Behavior

The Flash Slug can be found slowly swimming on its own. It notably swims further off the sea floor than most other small creatures, often being found 30-40 meters above the sea floor.

When approached by the Player, Flash Slugs will make a high-pitched squeal before briefly shaking, releasing a blinding flash of light, and trying to flee. This flash will disorient the Player, leaving an imprint on the screen for several seconds and causing blurry vision for a brief period after the flash fades. This ability has a short cooldown, allowing the Player to catch the creature before it charges up again.

Strategy

To avoid being blinded by the Flash Slug, the player should approach the creature at speed, such as with the Dash ability or a Wakemaker, and proceed to pick it up before it has a chance to blind the player.

Flash slugs will try to blind the player when they are in the Tadpole. If the Tadpole is piloted right beside a flash slug, it can be picked up as soon as the player exits the Tadpole.

Recipes

The Flash Slug is used in the following crafting recipes:

• Isotonic Water: Crafted by combining Flash Slug + Salt in a Fabricator.

Databank Entry

Seaslug kleptopharos, the stolen beacon slug. A free-swimming, luminescent relative of the waterslug with chimeric traits from another species entirely.

1. Microbial photocell

The flash slug is powered by the same type of microbial fuel cell present in the waterslug. The slug inhales plankton as it swims, which it digests with photodecomposition and feeds to luminescent bacteria that live in coils of glassy fiber deep in its mantle. These fibers generate and direct bioluminescence, and may in fact be biological lasers.

2. Light control

The flash slug uses its light to attract food and mates. When threatened, the slug charges up a flash of blinding coherent light to drive off attackers. Spectrogenetic analysis suggests this defense mechanism evolved from a system of internal gene regulation: its original function, millions of years ago, was to activate and deactivate genes inside the slug's body with coded light signals.

3. Raylike body plan

The flash slug swims with ray-like wings that grow from its foot. CORRECTION: The first draft of this output incorrectly attributed these wings to genetic sequences transferred from a Protean ray. In fact, the wings are a development of the slug's mantle, like Earth's Spanish dancer. The shared sequences with Protean rays may be related to item 4 below.

4. Enigmatic viral traffic

Millihertz variations in the slug's flash patterns appear to be correlated with Proteavirus activity inside the slug's tissues. The flash signals what the virus is doing — but also triggers changes in viral activity in other slugs (and, perhaps, other species that see the flash). It is possible that the flash slug's light displays give the Proteavirus a high-speed data channel.

Assessment: may provide a useful deterrent against predators if gripped. Close eyes to avoid damage.

Source: Scan a Flash Slug

Gallery

In Game

     

Trivia

• When held in hand, the Flash Slug will produce light.