Shadow looked at Johnson, but said nothing. Instead, he toggled his invisible throat mic. “Silhouette, evidence of Dark Matter confirmed. We have corpses. Over.”
Dark Matter. To most, it was the theoretical stuff that held the universe together, but to the BlackGuard, it was the code name for whatever target they’d been assigned on a given mission. Johnson hadn’t been told about the Dark Matter, but apparently, they were after whatever had done this to these people.
Johnson fought the chill threatening to shake through his body.
Silhouette’s confident voice came through all the headsets. “Copy that. It’s the same up here. Ten total. Continue forward. Will join shortly. Over.”
“Copy that.” Shadow stood. “Out.” He turned to Johnson. “Good news. You’re on point.”
Everything in Johnson’s being, from his cells to his soul, shouted at him to run, to admit he wasn’t cut out for this, that they’d put their faith in the wrong man. But he ignored the urge, refusing to abandon his family. Be strong, he told himself. Be smart. Show these assholes you can be one of them.
With a nod, Johnson stepped back into the hall and led the way, sweeping two more empty rooms before reaching the end, and the piled debris. Another body, torn apart, inside out. He knew the dead held no real interest, so he continued past without pointing it out.
As they moved to the second deck, he picked up the pace, growing more confident with each room swept. After finding ten more bodies, he became numb to the mounting number of dead, seeing them as objects, not victims. I can do this, he thought, opening another door, seeing a corpse, and then moving on. I can do it.
But his subconscious was a whirlwind of observations and unanswered questions. Each person had been killed violently as something had emerged from within them. Not something...somethings. Each body had three holes, sometimes merged into one gaping wound, but never more than three. Had they been infected with a flesh eating disease? Parasites? How was the entire crew affected before they could call out a mayday and report their position?
It wasn’t his job to know or discover the answers to these questions, so when they reached the far end of the second deck hallway, he continued down the metal stairs to the third deck. The label on the closed hatch read, Living Quarters, Mess, Galley.
“Silhouette,” Shadow said, his voice just a whisper through the earbuds. “We are on deck three. ETA? Over.”
“On your six,” Silhouette replied. “Thirty seconds.”
Johnson looked back, curious if they should wait, but Shadow urged him forward with a two finger point.
Knowing that Silhouette would soon join them and see him in action, Johnson threw himself into the task of clearing rooms. He moved quickly, efficiently, sweeping the many bunkrooms, sometimes finding bodies, sometimes not, but never looking back to see if Silhouette had joined them.
The room at the end of the hall was labeled Messdeck, but Johnson barely registered the sign, or that the space beyond would be different from all the rest—until he opened the door and looked inside.
Everything was black.
Green night vision returned, revealing a white-green floor covered with dark stains. But the rest of the large space was impenetrable darkness. “What the—I think my goggles are broken.”
Then the darkness moved, spreading out along the floor. A sound like static filled the air: hundreds of hard, sharp points striking the floor.
“It’s alive,” he said, stepping back, thumbing off the safety on his weapon.
“Hold him,” Silhouette said.
Johnson tried to turn around, but he was stopped by three sets of hands that felt robotic. Impossibly strong. He fought, a scream building in his throat, but Silhouette’s next words shocked his system silent.
“Nighthawk, this is BlackGuard. Come in. Over.”
“We read you BlackGuard. What’s your status? Over.”
Silhouette looked up as Johnson craned his neck back. “Sorry, son, but you were the crappiest soldier we could find that wouldn’t be missed.”
The sentence struck Johnson in the gut, and it was quickly followed by a constricting tightness that had nothing to do with his emotional state. He was locked in a coiled grip that tightened over his midsection. Then, stabbing pain.
Once, twice, three times.
“Dark Matter acquired,” Shadow said.
Gunfire, painfully close, filled the metal hallway with ear-splitting noise, flashing light and the stench of gunpowder. With a shriek, the coiled tightness fell away. But twisting pain blossomed anew, roiling in Johnson’s gut.
“It’s happening fast,” Specter said.
The hallway shook as Obsidian slammed the hatch closed and said, “The lock is broken.”