Page 18 of Shadow Blind

The six SEALs had been infected the moment they turned the dead locals over. The bots would have entered through their hands and fingers. Possibly even through the soles of their boots. Gloves and boots didn’t prevent bot penetration. His little soldiers could pierce anything but the densest of metals. A weapon that could be circumvented by protective clothing wasn’t much of a weapon, was it?

Once a person was infected, the bots immediately began scraping biological materials from within the host’s body—calcium from the bones, iron from the blood, proteins from the various cells, as well as a multitude of other elements. Then they began replicating, creating hundreds and then thousands more bots. Most of the bots would migrate to the brain to attack the amygdala and hypothalamus, as well as disrupting the neural connectivity of the brain. The remaining nanobots shed into the skin and surrounding areas, waiting to infect additional hosts.

He settled back, and took a sip of coffee.

“Where the hell are you going?”

The question came from the laptop, but it was the edge to the voice that caught Clark’s attention. He focused on the window that was greenlit, showing—he glanced at the name—Sean Buckman was speaking.

Winchester responded in an unnaturally calm tone. “Just getting my thermal blanket.”

“Liar.” Buckman laughed. An ugly, taunting bark of a sound. “You don’t get cold.” His rifle lifted. “Don’t fucking move.”

Five of the six cameras were locked on Sean Buckman. He leaned closer to the screen. There was a distinct twitch in the corner of Buckman’s eye—his bloodshot eye.

“Fuck you,” Buckman snarled, his rifle rising higher. “Nobody is restraining me. Nobody is stealing my ability to defend myself. I’ll see you all dead first.”

The twitching had doubled. Yep, NNB26 had infected them. Clark smiled in expectation, almost vibrating with anticipation.

The confirmation came seconds later.

“Base, we’re infected. Early signs are twitching faces and fingers and bloodshot eyes,” the squad’s leader said.

Wow. Winchester had certainly identified those symptoms quickly. He glanced at Buckman’s camera feed, which was focused on the squad leader. Interesting… Still no yelling or screaming—at least from the SEALs. There was plenty of yelling coming over the comm, but all from the base.

Clark dialed the base audio down so he could hear what was happening between his subjects.

“Lurch!” the squad’s leader shouted. His video feed jittered, before centering on a huge Viking of a man, charging toward Buckman. “Stand down!”

Lurch? Oh, yeah, Nathan James. Damn, these nicknames were annoying.

The meltdown came fast after that.

Chuff. Chuff. Chuff.

The rifle fire didn’t sound like he’d expected. No sharp staccato reports. More like a couple of subtle coughs.

Nathan James’s head disappeared, and he dropped to the ground. More chuffing and two more men went down.

“You killed them! Why did you kill them?” Peter Hutcheson screamed. The man’s face was red, sweating. The skin next to his red eyes twitched. His stare was a thousand miles blind.

Hutcheson lifted his rifle, aimed it at Winchester. The squad leader dropped to the ground; his camera feed chaotic. Another burst of chuffs hit the audio feed. Hutcheson fell. Clark checked the remaining camera feeds. How many men were left?

Just Winchester and Chris Benton.

The two men’s cameras were focused on each other. Clark’s eyebrows rose. Benton didn’t have his rifle up. He leaned in to get a better look at Benton through Winchester’s camera feed. The face on the feed was twitching, and the eyes were bloodshot, but the gaze staring back at him was self-aware. The guy hadn’t gone crazy yet.

“It started with a tingle,” Benton said. “An almost electrical tingle in my mind.”

Interesting. Clark made a note on his tablet. Nobody had mentioned that symptom before.

“Find out who did this to us.”

The command startled a laugh from Clark. Good luck with that.

Through Winchester’s camera, Clark watched Benton shove the barrel of his handgun into his mouth and pull the trigger. He dropped to the ground.

A guttural sound, like a horrified rasp, broke from Winchester before his camera jerked away. The camera feed bounced and swayed, before lifting and filming the dark sky. A raw, primitive howl filled the silence.

---