Discovery

"Can we please head back? We've been searching for days but we still haven't found even a trace!"

Reggie Holoren practically begged the captain, even dropping to his bony knees for a dramatic flair.

"Our Vexor Scanner hasn't beeped at all, that means there's nothing around!"

"Shut it, Reggie. I paid with everything we had on this information, if we can't find whatever is causing gravitational fluctuations here, then I might have to sell you to save my bottom line! Yet even that wouldn't be enough!". The captain swiftly shot back.

Reggie groaned while getting back up and trudging along with the Captain through a seemingly endless plain of small orange rocks. The single orange sun beaming down on them added an orange tint to everything including the sky, something which Reggie had gotten sick of and swore to change as his favorite color.

As they continued scanning along their planned route, the ground suddenly trembled.

"Damn the seismic shift came two hours early! Quick, get our impact pads on!" The captain should to Reggie.

Reggie quickly unlocked a set of thick pads that hung from his belt and handed half to the captain. They both quickly strapped the pads to their limbs and back and dropped flat to the ground as the trembling increasingly intensified. The orange rocks on the surface started to bounce on the surface, some of them hitting the backs of the captain and Reggie.

"What kind of stupid planet has seismic shifts like these?" Reggie gritted through his teeth as his back began to bruise despite the impact pads reducing the impact by a large margin.

"Hold on for a bit longer, it shouldn't last for too lon---" CRACK.

The ground suddenly separated into two halves alongside them, placing them on the edge of one of the two new cliffs. Reggie's grip on the groves of the ground slipped causing him to shift towards the edge of the still trembling cliff.

"Damn it Reggie HOLD ON!" The captain hurriedly shouted, unable to give hide the panic in his voice.

He pushed himself off the ground to stand while being shaken up. He moves swiftly towards Reggie, but Reggie is still sliding towards the edge. As the Captain continues for Reggie the distance between the two narrow.

"Caaaaptain!" Reggie screams as his legs abruptly lose solid ground and dangle off the edge.

The captain jumps, grabbing Reggie's hand with one hand at the last minute and keeping him from falling off the edge. His other hand gripping a hook jimmied in a small groove.

"Hold tight kid, it will all be over soon!"

However, that did not happen. Instead, a long brown tentacle emerges from the crevice created by the parted ground, curling around Reggie's leg. His eyes open in horror as he is suddenly ripped from the Captain's hand and is sent hurtling down into the darkness in silence.

"NOOOOOOOO"

The captain screams, pulling a pistol from his belt and trying to meaninglessly shoot whatever horrible creature took Reggie from him. As the seismic shift dies down, all that is left is an eerie silence. The Captain sits without making a sound, his golden eyes glaring into the crevice with his brown eyebrows scrunched up. The light breeze kicks up his blond brown hair, giving him a messy look to match his scraggly brown beard.

"You were the only one to stick with me, now look where that made you end up. I really am a curse" The captain quietly whispered. He wouldn't cry, it's not something he was capable of. His mind internalizing the pain and sorrow he feels into fuel he can use to survive, it was the way he was brought up.

Still gripping his pistol, he pulls it up to unload its magazine. He grabs a blast bullet magazine on his belt and loads it into the pistol.

"I'll do this to honor you, Reggie"

Jimmying the hook into a large groove on the surface, he climbs down into the deep crevice, jumping step by step along the cliff face. As the darkness begins to engulf him he switches on his headlamp to reveal yet even more darkness below him. Realizing the immense depth of the crevice, he nevertheless continues down, unconcerned with the unknown.

Eventually, he reaches the bottom and his feet touch a surprisingly flat floor. His shoulders barely touch the walls of the narrow path he is in.

The air chills as the captain hears a deep gurgle from one direction. He swiftly checks his gear and his pistol and heads towards the sound.

The further he moves along the path the louder the gurgles were. After some time, he comes across a massive cavern with a long crack on its ceiling which looked to have been exposed by seismic shift. The cavern was lit up by a soft blue light emanating from the back.

BEEP BEEP BEEP

The Vexor Scanner on his belt started signaling without pause.

'The grav fluctuations came from here?' He thought. 'Maybe I can at least finish this job and have a fitting funeral for you, Reggie'.

The captain advanced, moving towards the source of the blue light. As he approached it, the source revealed itself to be a large lamp beside what looked like a normal Secpad, a verification tool that confirms an identity based on the DNA collected from the hand.

Naturally, the captain was cautious. It was bad practice to interact with any unknown Secpads. It many remote secure areas, if the verification fails, the secured asset may trigger hostile countermeasures to deal with the supposed trespasser.

The captain slowly approached the Secpad to inspect it. It looked like an angled vertical rectangular pad with a smaller rectangle within it filled with light blue squares. At the bottom was an engraved logo of an X with a planet orbiting it. Tagged Secpads like these generally meant they belonged to a state or an institute however, the captain didn't recognize it.

The Secpad itself seemed custom-built instead of being an off-the-shelf model with physical features commonly found over 3000 years ago.

'It must be an ancient site which contains something very important. Tagged custom Secpads aren't usually found in common places. I could get a lot of credits for this information'

As his mind churned through possible avenues to make money off it, the Secpad abruptly started to glow with an artificial voice accompanying it.

[Potential target uninitiated, Executing Protocol 93 Section 52, Forced Recognition]

The captain immediately jumped back but a tiny robotic limb with a two-prong claw appeared underneath the Secpad and instantly extended to grab the captain's wrist and retracted it to place his hand to the Secpad.

[Surface analysis indicates Stage 5 Body Modification, initiating Submission Protocol 54]

The captain tried to grab his pistol to retaliated but a surge of electricity abruptly shocked him.

'AHHHhhh. WHAT'S GOING ON I SHOULD BE ABLE TO HANDLE ELECTRICITY. This is bad, the Secpad is able to recognize my body modification and adjust its intensity, it's definitely not normal!'.

With his hand forced on the Secpad, a square on it shifted back to reveal a needle which promptly drew blood from his fingertip and then disappeared back into the Secpad.

[Analyzing DNA Signature, Detecting Koval74YC DNA Encryption, Decrypting..., Decrypted DNA indicating non-hostile origins, Executing Protocol 93 Section 91 {CLASSIFIED}]

'What?! It's able to decrypt my DNA? How is that possible?'

The captain was dumbfounded. His DNA encryption is a Tier 6 secure encryption. Generally, only entities greater than Middle states or powerful organizations are able to decrypt it. However considering the Secpad being over 3000 years old, it could only belong to Super-States or Top Tier Organizations at that time.

As his brain continued to churn trying to figure a way out, the rock wall behind the Secpad began to crumble, revealing a solid sealed high-tech door. The door slid open to reveal a clean and pristine interior filled with lab and research equipment. On either side of the door, parts of the walls shifted back to allow what looked like high-power laser rifles to emerge, both pointing towards him.

[As according to Protocol 93 Section 1, you are now to commandeer the asset, Failure to proceed will result in Immediate Termination]

'What the hell have I got myself into? It would have been easier if Reggie was here'

The robotic limb imprisoning his hand to the Secpad let go and retracted, allowing him to pull his hand back and massage his sore wrists.

The captain moved side to side, recognizing the wall rifles tracking him impeccably.

'Those will definitely incinerate me and it looks like I won't have any time to dodge either. I guess I'll have to enter.'

He slowly entered through the doorway and analyzed the interior. The class of equipment present in the building was so far out of his league he was unable to even identify its function, to him it looked almost alien. The room he was in was large at around twenty meters and contained many large tubes filled with strange biological creations. Some were in a humanoid shape while others were akin to blobs of biological matter with protruding limbs. He noticed one test tube had a hole on the other side and a tunnel through its adjacent wall.

'Could the creature be from here?'.Captain theorized.

[Continue to the Asset Room]

An artificial voice spoke to him.

At the end of the room lay a large door engraved with on large X in this middle with hundreds of orbiting planets. He cautiously walked towards it, and when a meter away from it, the door slid open revealing a small five-by-five-meter room with what seemed to be a Cryo-Vessel in the middle.

[Reanimation Complete, Initiating Waking Protocol]

The vessel shaped like a coffin slowly opened its lid. Thick white smoke emerged from the vessel and spread out along the floor.

The captain peeked inside, and as the smoke cleared, he saw two eyes with pitch-black iris staring back at him. The captain instincts screamed at him to pull out his pistol but his rationale kept him from it in case the entire building retaliated. Instead, he continued to stare as the smoke cleared, revealing a 15-year-old boy with black hair donning a blue form-fitting suit.

The boy sat up and climbed out of the vessel, with the captain stepping back in sync with him. The boy then stared into the captain's eyes.

"Hello, I'm Daemon Xane, Nice to meet you!"