The smoke continued to roll through the corridor as if it was a living fog, curling and twisting until it blotted out the lights entirely. Visibility dropped to nothing. The Roman soldiers coughed behind their masks, eyes fixed on their thermal scopes, the only hope they had of seeing anything.

  One guard swept his sightline back and forth. The display painted the world in molten gold and crimson color: walls still warm from the heat of the lights. Then… movement.

  Except it wasn’t movement the way a human body would register. There was no warm bloom, no heat signature. Just a perfect void in the shape of a man, an absence of life carved into the image. The guard’s breath caught and held. It was wrong, like staring at a black hole. He didn’t even realize he was lowering the scope until the void surged toward him.

  The Puppet emerged with the force of a predator in mid-pounce, its body erupting from the fog in a blur of cold metal and twisting limbs. The guard barely had time to cry out before the nanotech buried itself into his flesh, snuffing his voice as quickly as his heat.

  The man beside him froze for a fraction of a second, then pivoted toward the sound, but it was too late. Another Puppet tore through the smoke, its silhouette invisible to thermals, its presence only marked by sudden absence where warmth should be. Then a spray of gunfire followed, wild, directionless while flying through the haze but hitting nothing.

  At the far end of the choke point, the machine gunner opened up, his belt-fed weapon hammering a blistering wall of fire into the fog. Tracers ripped through the smoke in long, glowing arcs. For a moment, it seemed like he might pin the enemy down.

  But then a shape, or rather, the lack of one had vaulted high over the incoming rounds. The Puppet came down on him in a single, fluid leap, clearing the gun’s arc entirely before slamming into him with bone-breaking force.

  Ampelius stayed just behind the smoke’s cover, listening to the chaos unfold. Boots scraped against the floor, shouts in Latin cut off mid-word, the muffled hiss of weapons discharging into nothing.

  Casper’s voice reached him with an update after all went quiet.

  “Fourteen seconds. Every hostile neutralized. Zero losses.”

  Ampelius smiled faintly. “Efficient.”

  Casper emerged from the haze of smoke as his form flickered with faint static. He drifted amongst the scorched walls as his lenses glowed faintly as he swept the sealed bulkheads and panels.

  “It appears to be another bunker door,” he reported. “This one leads deeper, possibility into the heart of the facility. Judging by the way they were dug in here, this may have been intended as their last stand. If we get through, we might be past their strongest defenses.”

  Ampelius nodded once, wiping ash and sweat from his brow. “Roger that. Work on the locks. I’ll scavenge what I can from the bodies.”

  He crouched among the fallen, recognizing some of the soldiers as he searched the belts and pouches for anything useful. Many had grenades, magazines, and specialized gear attached, all useful. The Puppets themselves loomed behind him like statues, their eyeless faces fixed forward, waiting in absolute stillness for his next order. Then a crack split the silence.

  One of the Puppets at his side suddenly jerked violently, half its skull blown apart in a spray of blackened nanotech. The corpse twitched, staggered two steps, then collapsed in a heap. A deafening shot echoed down the chamber, rolling through the smoke like thunder.

  The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  Ampelius spun, pistol already in hand. A Roman soldier had been hidden beneath a half-toppled crate, his face smeared with soot, eyes wide and furious, but also fearful. The man clutched a heavy rifle that gleamed with an unfamiliar finish. Ampelius raised his sidearm and emptied the entire magazine into him, each shot cracking and sparking as the Roman was flung back against the steel wall, leaving dark streaks as he slid down lifeless.

  The room fell quiet again, but the loss still hung heavy.

  Casper hovered over the ruined Puppet, his sensors running in rapid succession before shifting to the Roman’s weapon. His voice came through with a faint edge of curiosity.

  “Well,” he said flatly, “it seems there is a bullet that can kill our puppets.”

  He scanned the rifle in detail, the glow of his optics sliding along the barrel and chamber.

  “Armor-piercing,” he murmured. “But not of any type I have cataloged. This configuration isn’t in my archives, nor in any known Roman registry. It is possible this is experimental, perhaps a prototype rushed into the field.”

  Ampelius frowned, lowering his smoking pistol. “Experimental or not, it works.”

  “Indeed,” Casper replied. “And let me remind you, our supply of bodies is finite. If these rounds are present in greater numbers, every casualty costs us more than them. Make use of what you have. Adapt.”

  Ampelius glanced at the shattered Puppet, the first true loss since the assault began. The nanotech writhed weakly across the corpse’s face, unable to knit the ruin back together. It left behind a grim reminder that his army was not invincible.

  Casper drifted back to the sealed door, his projection flickering as he linked with the panel’s systems. “This one is simpler than the outer gate,” he said, already sending streams of code through the controls. “The mechanism allows remote entry from either side. They weren’t expecting a siege here. Security was less of a concern.”

  Within a minute, warning sirens pulsed. Red lights spun overhead, throwing harsh streaks across the walls as heavy locks released with a clanging groan. The reinforced door shuddered, gears grinding, before it slowly opened.

  Ampelius knelt by a Roman corpse, prying loose a rifle slick with blood. He checked the chamber, thumbed the safety, and rose as the door yawned open.

  Silence greeted him as he got a glimpse inside.

  As the chamber lights flickered to life, pale fluorescence spread down a narrow corridor. The air inside was still, almost too still, as if the place itself held its breath.

  Casper floated through first, sensors sweeping in every direction. His lenses pulsed faintly.

  “I’m detecting heartbeats,” he said after a pause, his voice low. “Several. Stationary. Elevated. But no one visible.”

  Ampelius’ jaw tightened. He raised his weapon, sweeping it across the empty hallway. The hum of the fluorescent lights filled the silence, broken only by the faint hiss of ventilation ducts. Somewhere deeper, metal creaked, a bit too soft to be mechanical, or too uneven.

  Casper’s head tilted. “They are hiding. I'm uncertain of whether this is an ambush, proceed carefully.”

  Ampelius gave a curt nod. At his command, a cluster of Puppets lurched forward into the corridor. He left several more stationed at the doorway, their eyeless faces fixed outward like gargoyles on watch, while one converted the bodies.

  The deeper chamber awaited, its walls not just military steel but lined with civilian markings: posters half torn, crates marked with medical insignias, signs of habitation. Whatever lay inside was no barracks. It was something else.

  The voice cut through the silence from deeper inside the chamber.

  “Don’t shoot! I’m unarmed!” The words carried a thick Latin accent, trembling with fear.

  Ampelius froze, rifle steady, eyes narrowing as movement stirred in the gloom. A man stepped out from behind a wall, his white lab coat stark against the shadows. His hands were raised high, fingers trembling. His knees almost buckled with every step, yet he forced himself forward, his fear plain in every motion.

  “None of us are armed,” he stammered. “We are researchers, scientists of many fields. The guards and soldiers you fought, they were all outside this area. We have no weapons.”

  The chamber fell into an uneasy stillness. Puppets loomed in the background, silent and motionless, while the lone scientist’s voice echoed against the steel walls. Ampelius said nothing, his rifle trained on the man’s chest, the choice of what came next hanging heavy in the air.