Their two robots rumbled along ahead of them. Their belt-feds were smoking from the heat, but they still had plenty of ammo left. “I’ve got nothing in sight,” Archer reported. “They’ve retreated. The sensor balls can’t open doors, so I’m cutting through an air vent and trying to follow them.”

Lights were still blinking on the various machines and computer monitors were still on, so they hadn’t lost power. “Somebody find a light switch,” Cueto ordered.

The agents moved quickly, leapfrogging from cover to cover. Only hardened combat vets ended up on the Strike Team. They were ready, and all of them knew that just because the MCB’s fancy sensors hadn’t picked up any danger didn’t mean it wasn’t there.

Franks didn’t recognize most of the machinery around them. It all seemed to be complicated diagnostic medical equipment. Franks’ medical knowledge was limited to putting himself back together, and when he had to do that himself it was usually the old-fashioned way, with needle and thread, though the invention of superglue had been extremely helpful.

Franks came around the corner and came face to face with a demon.

His flashlight beam reflected off the glass between them. It wasn’t awake yet. The body wasn’t fully formed, but he could sense the evil spirit already clinging to the congealing mass of protein. To one of the Fallen it might as well have put up a sign saying that this property was claimed and there was no trespassing, but to the humans it would just look like a fleshy, humanoid blob. It was floating in a greenish liquid, inside a large glass container, held upright by dozens of wires and tubes stuck through its body.

“That’s disgusting . . .” Gutterres said. “It’s unnatural.”

Franks walked around the glass tube. The tissues were soft and pink. Layers of muscle were slowly building on top of the skeleton. There was no skin yet.

“I know you need evidence, but my gut is telling me to burn these things,” Gutterres said.

Franks knew that wasn’t his gut talking, that was Gutterres’ human decency offended by this spectacle. Some humans were more sensitive to the presence of evil than others.

While the sweep teams reported in, Franks signaled for the men to spread out and search the factory. One of the men stopped in front of a monitor. “That thing’s got a heartbeat. According to this, there’s a bunch more too.”

“Is there a birth date?” Franks asked.

“Yes, sir. Most are really recent, but the oldest one is from a few months ago.”

Cueto and Franks shared a glance. There was their evidence that Stricken had been working without authorization.