Page 14 of Shadow Blind

Infections, on the other hand, whether viral or bacterial, had incubation periods. Some were long, some short, but they all had them. How long was the incubation period for the sickness that attacked the inhabitants of Karaveht?

Hell, what were the early symptoms? It would help if they knew how long it took from exposure to the first incident in Karaveht.

He stopped walking and triggered his mic. Instantly, the cold pressed in. “Agent Dawson, have you received any new intel on what happened in Karaveht?”

“Negative, Alpha One.” The response came from Montana. “Any updates on you and your team’s condition?”

“Status quo,” he said after a beat of silence. “It would help if we had a timeline on Karaveht—an understanding of how long it took for the insanity to progress.”

“Understood, Alpha One.” Montana sounded sympathetic, which illustrated how serious the situation was. “I’ll reach out to our contagion crew, see if they have anything to offer.” The sympathy gave way to a harsh demand. “Keep us apprised of your team’s health.”

“Copy.” Aiden let go of the mic.

An hour later, hot and sweaty, they climbed the final hill to their evac site.

He knew his teammates as well as he knew himself. He’d recognize irregularities in their behavior. If any of them started acting…off…he’d restrain them. If he started acting weird, they’d have to restrain him. It was the only thing available to them until the chopper arrived.

“We need to take precautions.” Aiden stopped next to the cold weather rucksack he’d ditched behind a boulder as soon as they’d hopped off the chopper. He shrugged out of his assault pack and squatted to unzip the ditch kit.

The assault pack contained the essentials of an active op—extra ammo, distractors, frag grenades, flares, extra gloves, the M50 respirators, breaching equipment, and an extra radio. It was small, light, and easy to maneuver in. The ditch kit, on the other hand, was his home away from home. It was also heavy, bulky and unwieldy in the field. It was ditched at drop-off and returned to once the op was completed. It carried all the extras that made life bearable but weren’t necessary for an insertion: extra cold weather layers, thermal blankets, three days of water and MREs, a puff sleeping bag and jacket, a camp stove, and a rudimentary med kit, along with the ever-present ammo and secondary hand weapon. The ditch kit carried everything necessary for cold weather survival if exfil didn’t go as planned and they had to hunker down for a day or two.

“What’re you thinking?” Squirrel asked. He’d removed his goggles, and his brown eyes were grim as he shrugged out of his assault kit and lowered it to the ground.

Good question. Aiden’s fingers paused as they rummaged through the compression bag at the bottom of his rucksack with the thermal layers of clothing. Now that he’d stopped moving, the cold was getting grabby. Everything was separated by compression bags in the ditch kit. The lightest and fluffiest bags at the bottom, the heavier and bulkier bags towards the top.

“First step is monitoring ourselves.” Aiden grabbed a T-shirt and a dry thermal top to layer over it. “Anyone feeling…” He frowned before shrugging, “…different?”

“Different? Like how? Like I suddenly have a hankering to use the lot of you for target practice?” Benny asked, pulling his balaclava down to free his mouth. “I got ketamine in my kit. If anyone melts down, we can knock them out.”

Benny was their combat medic. In their years together, he’d patched them all up. He knew what drug would serve them best if someone went schizoid. But all drugs had their disadvantages. And ketamine took a while to work—not a long while, somewhere between two and five minutes, but those minutes would feel like forever if they were trying to hold someone down.

“We’d have to restrain until the drug takes effect,” Aiden said, pulling his balaclava down as well.

Which presented a problem. Restraining a dude in peak physical condition, a dude who’d been taught a dozen ways to kill someone without the use of a weapon, a dude caught in an “excited delirium” state…

He grimaced. Hell, that sounded like a surefire ticket to death.

“We’d be better off removing our weapons and hiding them, then restraining each other now, while we’re stable, while we can cooperate,” Aiden said, his voice reasonable, knowing with absolute certainty that his brothers would hate that suggestion.

He wasn’t fond of it himself. Taking such extreme action would leave them vulnerable. Not just to each other, but to any shitkicker regime patrolling the area.

But which outcome was more likely, death by an enemy that might be in the area, or death by each other, if any of them carried the contagion that had decimated Karaveht?

“No fucking way,” Grub snarled as he yanked his balaclava over his head and tossed it toward his ruck. The dude’s thin beard appeared to shimmy in agitation. “We don’t even know if we’re infected. If we are, we don’t know when the insanity will hit.” He threw his assault kit to the ground hard enough to pop the bolt cutters out. “For all we know, those poor bastards were infected days, even weeks ago.”

Aiden shrugged. “Once the chopper reaches us and returns to base, medical can screen us. But if the insanity hits before the chopper arrives, we need to take preventative measures, for the exfil crew, as well as for each other.”

“By restraining each other?” Grub snapped. His fists slammed down on his hips, and his wiry body seemed to radiate frustration and fury. “By leaving ourselves vulnerable to any motherfucking local who passes by? Hell no. We keep our eyes peeled and act when necessary.”

Act when necessary?

The hairs on the nape of Aiden’s neck shot up. He stood and angled closer to get a better look at his teammate. What did Grub mean by that? Only two possibilities came to mind. Restrain the affected or kill them. God help them if Grub meant the latter.

They better tie him up now.

Aiden ran a hand over his head and studied his buddy. The dude’s face was jumpy as hell. Grub was one of the cooler guys on his crew. When shit went south, he reacted with caution. He assessed the situation. He was a stone steady kind of guy. Aiden had never seen him so worked up before.

His gaze settled on the twitch at the corner of Grub’s left eye.

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