PATIENT ZERO -The lone survivor
The other soldiers froze, their rifles snapping toward the archway.
"Contact! Sector 4!"
Nyosi, standing near the lead Chinook, turned her head. Her eyes narrowed as she saw the figure emerging from the dust.
Malik walked out of the shadows. He didn't limp. He didn't stagger. He floated an inch off the ground, his tattered robes snapping in an invisible wind. The violet sparks around him were no longer soft; they were jagged, like miniature lightning bolts, crackling with an entropic hunger.
"Kazi was wrong," Malik said, his voice amplified by the cavern’s natural acoustics until it sounded like the mountain itself was speaking. "He said we were a disease. He said we were a plague."