What the fuck?
What the fuck?
He spun, scanning the room. The tech guy was gone, but O’Neill stood at the back of the chamber. Frozen. Rigid. Staring with wide, haunted eyes and a gaping mouth. Aiden spun again, eyes frantically searching the room. No bugs. No dense, black cloud of horror. Not out here. He pivoted to scan the isolation unit behind the protective glass, his gaze skipping from zombified teammate to zombified teammate. Their mouths were still wide open, but the bugs were missing.
Where the fuck had they gone?
Had they hit him? Had they disappeared inside him? He scanned his body, searching for bloody holes or shredded clothing. Nothing.
Had he imagined the whole thing? Experienced a nightmare during the day?
Suddenly, a thick, black cloud shot back into the room from the window. One minute there was nothing...and the next a flying army of bugs. They swept over the heads and between the bodies of his dead teammates and converged in the middle of the isolation unit. From there they wheeled back toward the window in a synchronized murmuration of black.
He squinted. Where the hell had they come from? Fuck, what the hell were they? He squinted harder, watching them fly straight for him. Their glistening, elongated bodies shimmered with metallic radiance. Flies? No, too big for flies, and flies didn’t have stingers. Wasps? Black metallic wasps, with enlarged, wickedly curved stingers. They swept around his zombified teammates and hit the window, only to disappear. Again.
Aiden turned again, searching for the damn things. O’Neill still stood there, mouth agape. But there was no sign of the metallic wasps. A heartbeat later, maybe two, and the black insects were back. Streaming out of the window and past his dead teammates. They congregated at the very back of the isolation unit before wheeling and shooting for the window again. They were moving faster this time...so fast he couldn’t differentiate the individual insects. They were just a wave of gritty black.
What the hell? Were they trying to use speed to penetrate the glass? Could they be that aware? That intelligent? Once again, they hit the window and disappeared. Seconds later they returned, streaming back into the room. Only this time they slowed and flew back into the open mouths of his zombified teammates.
Frozen in place, Aiden simply stared, watching as the line of dead SEALs, at least those that still had jaws, worked their mouths shut, sealing the wasps inside.
“What the hell just happened?” Aiden asked, without turning his head.
“What happened is Faith. Her shield saved us from infection.” Wolf’s voice was a gritty rasp of its normal, smooth baritone.
A hoarsethank Christcame from behind him. Sounded like O’Neill’s voice. But more hoarse and less sarcastic.
“Faith?” Aiden finally turned to look at Wolf.
“Her shield,” Wolf clarified. “She created another. One like The Neighborhood’s. Only this one locks …things…into a place, rather than out of it.”
His brother’s face looked pale beneath his olive skin tone. His dark eyes were wide. Hell, his knees shook slightly too. Like those freaky wasps had knocked his legs out from beneath him. Good to know...at least Aiden wasn’t the only one trying to remain upright with spaghetti legs.
“And you couldn’t tell me that?” Aiden snapped. His heart rate was finally slowing, and his lungs were starting to work again.
“You never asked.” Wolf’s voice had already returned to its normal neutrality.
“Asshole,” Aiden said, but without much intensity. His lungs were still too winded to inject strength into his voice. He turned back to the window. The Squirrel suit was still standing there, doing that eyeless staring thing, his head cocked in that oddly birdlike way. “Tell me Faith erected the same kind of forcefield around the nanobot lab.”
“She did,” Wolf acknowledged.
Aiden relaxed. Faith’s shield had sure kept them safe during those three terrifying flights of the wasps. Maybe they had an actual shot of containing the bots if they got out.
“Those ...wasps…they look metallic to you?” He glanced over at Wolf in time to see his thoughtful nod. “Nanobots, you think?”
“It would seem likely.” Wolf shifted uneasily, his boots scraping against the flooring.
“Makes sense,” Aiden suppressed a shudder. “The nanobots are probably why Squirrel and the others are mobile again.” If the fuckers could reanimate a corpse, they could create nanobot insects too. “And those stingers...hell, they can transfer a lot more nanobots than a mere touch.”
Wolf simply nodded. Aiden turned his attention back to the window. The Squirrel-thing on the other side cocked its head and the coiled rattler on its neck flashed, which launched a memory.
Worn boots planted on a coffee table…a copper and black tattoo flashing every time Squirrel dug his hand into the stainless-steel bowl of popcorn.Aiden could almost smell the buttery, popcorn smell. See the movie scrolling across the huge television screen.
“You ever see The Mummy?” he asked, absently.
“The movie?” Wolf’s question seemed to come from a distance.
“Yeah. The one with Brendan Fraser. Squirrel loved that movie. Never got tired of it. Swear to God, he could watch it multiple times a day. Like a kid or something.” Wolf was silent for a moment. Aiden could almost hear him connecting the dots.
