The creature's shrieking became more and more intense but the stranger was still trying to process what happened.
His mind churned trying to find an answer before reaching a logical but surprising conclusion.
"Are you an Evol?"
"A what?" Daemon replied, genuinely confused. He had never heard of such a term before, even from before his pre-Cryo days.
"An Evol is someone who has received powerful implants that allow them to do crazy unnatural things," The stranger said patiently.
If the kid really was an Evol, that changed everything. Evol were generally beholden to, or part of states or powerful organizations, and if anyone related to the kid found he knew where the kid was, they likely wouldn't hesitate to dissect his brain to find out where the kid was.
"I don't think so? As far as I know, I've always been like this!"
At this point, the stranger simply assumed that Daemon was lying to keep it hidden. The feat he just witnessed and even was part of couldn't be explained to happen without specialized equipment, and could only be explained by Evol implants, which he heard were able to perform miracles even more insane than what just happened.
"Fine I'll keep you secret but we have to talk after we deal with this thing."
They put their attention back onto the still shrieking creature which had begun to violently pulse its own body. The creature suddenly began to expand uncontrollably, gaining a size about twice as high and wide as its original dimensions.
The stranger grabbed another blast magazine from his belt and after placing his empty blast magazine back onto his belt, loaded it into the pistol grip. He inspected the barrel and the muzzle, noticing slight deformations on both. He was using a cheap static ballistic pistol with modifying parts for versatile use with different round types. However, its lack of durability was starting to show and he expected that another magazine may completely shred the barrel, maybe even unintentionally discharge or backfire.
Nevertheless, he continued, noticing the creature writhing, but instead of attacking them it suddenly explodes. Flesh and blood are suddenly painted across the surface of the cavern, and even on both the stranger and Daemon.
The stranger started to wipe the slimy mess off him, still alert if the creature somehow still existed. Daemon was more interested in the creature's behavior.
"How interesting! Why would the creature possess such as behavior, there must be a reason."
He focused on the place where the creature exploded and found out why.
"Ah, I see! This was a mode of self-preservation!"
"What do you mean?" The stranger gruffly said, not understanding what the kid was talking about.
"It is the creature's form of asexual reproduction, in exploding it left a small version of itself that will continue to grow".
The stranger grunted and started to walk towards the mess.
There he found what Daemon was talking about, a creature that looked identical to the creature from before but smaller. It was pulsing up and down, it looked almost cute.
The stranger aimed his pistol and shot a blast round at it, completely eradicating it. All that was left of it was a small addition to the already mess of flesh and blood.
The stranger and Daemon both tried to wipe as much of the fleshy mush off their body and clothes as possible, but it was still quite pungent and they couldn't get rid of the smell. The stranger's black cloak and pants were now a shade of dark red while Daemon's form-fitting suit had a red layer over the blue color.
"What now? It seems you've completed your objective of killing the creature for whatever reason."
"What happens now is that I'm getting off this damn planet"
"Can I come with you?"
"No"
"Why not?"
"Because I said so"
The stranger started walking back to where he came from, trying to find a safe place to ascend. Reaching back to the narrow path he threw his hook attached to the rope up to a small ledge on the cliff face and started to ascend. However, he only managed to ascent a few meters before the ledge crumbled and sent him falling down and landing on his butt again.
"Arghhh"
"You won't be able to get far, the underground rock formations seem to be very weak and smooth. There aren't many places you can use your hook and few that you can use will probably crumble as well" Daemon said casually.
He was still following the stranger. Doubting that the stranger would be able to get back up, he was hoping to possibly tempt him by offering a way up.
The stranger ignored Daemon, opting to continue along the path scanning for any potential ledges or crevices to hook. Further down he found what seemed to be a bigger and more secure looking ledge to hook, however, it was much higher than the previous one. It took a few tries to even reach that high and took even longer to successfully hook it. After he did, he started to scale it. Slowly walking up the cliff face with his hands consecutively gripping the rope further up until he was 30 meters up when suddenly, the rope snapped, causing him to fall on his back.
"Arrhhhhh Dammit!" he groaned while holding his back. Fortunately, he still had his impact pads on which reduced the impact of the fall significantly, otherwise, he was sure he would have broken something.
In the end, he sat down trying to come up with better ideas to escape. His rope had snapped leaving his hook at least 50 meters up the cliff face and the cliff face itself was quite smooth which made it impossible to try to scale it.
"It's quite unusual for the cliff faces to be this smooth right after splitting you know? It must be because of the specific rock types and minerals that cause it to be like this!" Daemon said while admiring the rock.
"What a weirdo" The stranger thought. As much as he didn't want anything to do with the kid, he finally figured he was his only option to get out of here. He could have tried to continue on the path to look for new opportunities but all the provisions had been carried on Reggie and now he had nothing left. He turned towards Daemon and braced himself for some negotiations, something he knew he was terrible at.
"Alright, can you get me up?"
"Maybe?"
"The hell do you mean maybe?! I thought you really had a way up!" He almost shouted.
"Well I've only ever teleported objects before, and they can only be teleported within my perception"
The stranger willfully ignored that part about only teleporting objects. He understood that while it may have been the first time the kid teleported a person, at least he had done it to save his life.
"Do you have any ideas?"
"I can transfer power into almost anything, if I transfer power to you could easily climb the cliff face with pure grip strength! The thing is, I have to be constantly touching whatever I'm transferring power into" Daemon said.
"What a weird power" The stranger muttered.
"Anyways, fine, if it's possible, I'll just carry you on my back while I climb"
"Yea you could... But only if you promise to take me with you off this planet!" Daemon added.
He really didn't feel like staying any longer in this barren wasteland. The research creature is likely the only living thing that could survive on this barren planet.
"No" The stranger firmly said.
"You're an Exol, that means you're trouble. I could get myself killed just for knowing you exist! Plus Exol always have people supporting them, call your people or whatever, they can help you out, just leave me out of it"
"There's no one left!" Daemon remarked. He was starting to get emotional. He already did peripheral calculations in his mind with the surrounding environment. This planet was barren and the research base was the only thing here that was functional. The researchers from his pre-Cryo days didn't tell him much. They only ever talked about him and his powers.
"I'm telling you there is no one behind me, no one supporting me! It's been so long, they're probably dead!"
The stranger paused. What Daemon was saying actually made sense when he considered the clues he gathered. The secpad showed design choices that were popular thousands of years ago but non-existent today. Not to mention, he memorized all the Super State logo, and the tagged Secpad sported a logo he had never seen before. Adding that together with the fact that a secpad from thousands of years ago that was able to decrypt his DNA could only belong to a Super State at the time, the evidence was surmounting to the fact that this kid likely belonged to a fallen Super State.
That alone wouldn't mean he was safe, however. Super States do not fall easily, and when they do, remnants almost always exist. Who knew if a remnant society decided to hunt him to retrieve their 'asset'. He would not like to be the one being hunted!.
Unfortunately, this situation was very disadvantageous to him, and it seemed like the only option of getting out was Daemon.
"Fine, I'll help you out" He finally uttered.
Daemon beamed, he could finally explore the galaxy!