Indepted to Science - Chapter 5 [Fanfic]

STORY SUMMARY: There are many questions surrounding Exor intelligence. A young scientist gets to experience them firsthand when he saves one and gains an unexpected companion on his journey to escape the facility.

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Chapter 1: https://www.reddit.com/r/AbioticFactor/comments/1k71yw7/indepted_to_science_chapter1_fanfic/

==H==

Simon was neither an engineer nor an architect, but he somewhat questioned the practicality of having the Flathill portal open up into a treehouse.

Walking towards the balcony of the little wooden structure he immediately noticed three things.

First observation, there was an unusual mist in the air. It felt strange as if it wasn't natural. As a normal scientist, he would've just called it his nerves and moved on, but as a GATE scientist, he was nowhere near as quick to dismiss that theory.

Second observation, a strange, constant sound echoed from outside. It was almost rhythmic, like a song of sorts, but no human or instrument he knew could make these kinds of sounds.

Finally, and most distressingly, there was no portal. When he had entered Far Garden, there had been a portal back to Cascade, but this time around, it was absent.

He really hoped this lack of a return portal wouldn't turn out to be a problem, especially considering how Reckless had followed him here.

Sure, the Exor might be intelligent and a lot less hostile compared to many other creatures he had encountered, but he didn't want to find out if his alien companion's gratitude or patience had limits. Saving someone's life was a solid foundation for trust, but not an unbreakable one.

Having no way to return to the Far Garden portal, they were effectively cut off from AnteverseII, something that risked greatly agitating the Exor, especially if more humans got involved.

The somewhat defensive posture Reckless had towards him was more than enough proof for that point. The Exor didn't seem comfortable with him wearing a hazmat suit, and Simon was pretty sure that the Exor might've just attacked him if he hadn't witnessed the scientist put the suit on.

Despite that, however, Simon was nowhere near ready to take it off. The fact that he had found it at the portal entrance suggested that a hazmat suit had been necessary here. Ever since he had stumbled into Far Garden only to find it to be highly radioactive, he became a lot more cautious. Sure, his Geiger Counter said that the area was radiation-free, but for all he knew the mist was toxic.

Was it possible to store samples of mist? He really needed to look into creating himself some sort of makeshift portable lab. Sure, anything he made would be makeshift at best considering the tools he was limited to, but the inability to properly study the things he came across was infuriating.

With no portal to return, there was no other option but to move onwards, and in this case, it meant getting down from the treehouse.

Ignoring the fact that Reckless had decided to simply jump off the balcony, the scientist settled for the ladder, carefully working his way down.

No, he wasn't getting complacent, he had already found out that Exor could fall from much greater heights without breaking anything, so there simply wasn't anything new to record for his research.

Once down below, he started looking around some more. He had never actually planned ahead this far and was unsure how he was supposed to continue from here.

He had found a way out of the facility, but something told him that he had yet to reach civilization. Flathill appeared to have been abandoned.

Windows and doors were barricaded shut with planks, doors were locked, and not a sound could be heard other than that strange song.

In the end, it was Reckless who made the decision for him, grabbing him and dragging him off. The Exor seemed on edge and was locked in a fight or flight response, pulling Simon through an open door.

They ended up finding themselves in some form of supermarket, this one mainly dedicated towards food, judging by the items lying around.

The canned food especially caught his attention. He had no idea how long this place had been abandoned, but with canned goods, he would know for certain that they hadn't expired.

His stomach sang happy tunes at that. He was slowly growing sick of feeding himself on vending machine snacks and Warren's peas. He had considered alien meat, but in the end avoided that risk, having no idea whether or not that would be safe.

Now however he could finally eat something else. He happily grabbed the first can he came across, checking the label.

His face fell. He was holding a can of peas.

"Son of a-"

-000-

Reckless suspiciously eyed the icecream, before giving Simon a confused look. His companion was definitely not familiar with the scientific method, looking by itself wouldn't get him far.

"It's food, a sweet desert." Simon finally decided to explain, grabbing a package for himself and scooping up some of it with the handy little spoon that came provided with the passage.

Sure, it was still a snack, but it tasted different enough from vending machine junk that Simon didn't complain, simply happy to have a new flavor on his tongue.

Was this stealing? Well, since it was abandoned, probably not. He should look that up later... or maybe not. What you don't know you can't feel guilty for.

Somewhat reassured by his companion, Reckless finally decided to taste the stuff with a careful nibble.

Simon silently wished Exor had any form of facial expression so he could better judge what was going through his companion's head. He got the answer a second later when the exor promptly bit into the ice cream, greedily emptying the ice cream package, having minimal mercy for the package which disappeared down his gullet as well if it dared to get in the way.

The Exor liked the sweet flavor. This tied in with Simon's earlier observations. Exor were omnivorous, considering how they ate both anteverse wheat as well as meat. This suggested that they had similar taste receptors to humans.

The main question had always been however whether or not Exor could actually taste in the first place, a theory he could now proudly confirm.

His entire train of thought was brought to a halt by an ear-splitting screech...

Whirling around, he found Reckless on the floor, clutching his head. It took him a moment to connect the dots, but he quickly concluded that the Exor had managed to acquire himself an unhealthy dose of cold-stimulus headache, better known as brain freeze.

"Fascinating. Evolution does seem to have all kinds of paralle- huff!"

Simon collapsed to the ground after Reckless promptly punched him in the gut.

"I wasn't mocking you..." the scientist managed to wheeze out, going with the first assumption as to what the Exor might've misunderstood, before realizing the futility of it, since Reckless couldn't understand him in the first place.

Much to his relief the Exor seemed to have vented most of his anger with that one punch, as no further attacks followed it up.

He should start looking into translating Exor once he gets back to his base, maybe fabricate himself some form of...

Hold up, what was he thinking? He had never intended to go back to his base, he had come to Flathill in order to escape. Talk about being sidetracked, had he just completely forgotten his original mission over something as basic as food?

Good thing that the only one around to witness this embarrassment was someone who didn't understand it in the first place.

He slowly got back to his feet, the pain having reduced to a bearable level, and turned toward Reckless, who luckily seemed much calmer now.

"Let's start looking around and see if we can find anyone. Even if we don't find anyone, we might at least find hints."

Reckless on his part didn't understand anything Simon said, and simply trailed the scientist when he left the room, but the thought counted.

-000-

Simon had not expected to find anything in the first building and was positively surprised to find a loose vent upstairs.

Someone had moved it recently, and judging by the large size of said vent, Simon speculated that someone had crawled through it.

Conclusively he himself had to crawl through as well to find out more, so he got to work dismantling the protective grit. It wasn't the cleanest job he had ever done and promptly turned the grit into scrap metal, but it left him with an opening large enough that both he and Reckless could pass through.

He seemed to be crawling through a lot of vents lately, why were they designed so large in the first place?

Taking out his flashlight, Simon ducked inside, carefully working his way forward. It was only when a snarl echoed from behind him that he paused, turning around.

Reckless was still standing at the entrance of the vent, and seemed either hesitant or outright unwilling to follow.

The exor proceeded crouched down and almost gently tried becon Simon to come back out of the vent. The Exor appeared just a bit too large for the vents.

"I'll be back alright? I just have to quickly check something."

Reckless grunted when it became clear he had failed to persuade Simon, as he stood back up and smashed a window, taking to the roof.

"Or I you just meet you on the other side. That works as well I guess..."

The grit at the other end of the vent was loose as well, and Simon quickly pushed it to the side.

"The crusaders, you're not one of them... what do you seek?"

The scientist snapped to the voice, finding a somewhat particular sight.

It was a human, but that wasn't the strange part. It was a human in some kind of strange suit or armor. Purple with some sort of ceramic texture and strangely abstract, having small dents or holes with two long rounded protrusions where the shoulders were.

If it weren't for the stranger wearing it, Simon would've assumed it was some kind of abstract art piece. Even now he couldn't 100% disprove that they hadn't decided to wear a statue for some reason.

"Oh, hey," Simon replied, too baffled to say anything else. "I'm looking for a way out of town?"

The stranger laughed at that. "You want out? Of course, you want out. Like them. The giants. You are trapped here..."

"Giants?" Simon interrupted him confused. "What giants?"

The stranger didn't reply, he didn't need to. Simon got his answer soon enough when a soft stomping slowly got closer, growing louder with every step. Looking outside past the window, Simon froze in fear when a creature as tall as a building strode out of the fog.

==H==

AUTHOR NOTES:

Thanks for reading my story.

A special thanks to the devs for making this amazing game.

Anyway, it's been a while since the last chapter. I decided recently to make a new safe and replay the game from scratch in order to refresh my memories on the early game. Nevertheless I'm only human, so if I miss anything or get something wrong, please tell me.

PS: 10 out of 10 scientists confirm that constructive criticism is an excellent tool towards improvement, so if you got any, hit me with it, even if it's negative.

-000-

Next Chapter: Soon...

Previous Chapter: https://www.reddit.com/r/AbioticFactor/comments/1kjfpeg/indepted_to_science_chapter_4_fanfic/

First Chapter: https://www.reddit.com/r/AbioticFactor/comments/1k71yw7/indepted_to_science_chapter1_fanfic/