Mirella stood still in the middle of the street for a few seconds, looking at the damage with a calm that did not match the scene. There was Black Ice stuck to the walls, white burn marks on the ground, and pieces of duplicates melting into dark puddles between the stones. The smell was horrible. It was not normal blood, nor ordinary burned flesh. It seemed like a mixture of old shadow, rust, and a body left too long in a damp basement.
Victor realized she was not impressed.
She was counting.
Natasha was doing the same thing, but with less patience. She passed by one of the false corpses, crouched, touched the dark puddle with the tips of two gloved fingers, and rubbed the residue between them. The material tried to cling to the leather like something alive, but she pressed her thumb against her index finger and crushed the shadow until it turned to ash.
"Low-autonomy duplicates," Natasha said. "But some had direct command."
