“I know that most of you have already seen scrabs up close and personal, so some of this may be redundant, but we want to make sure you have a full picture of what we’re dealing with,” Grayson said. “Plus I know that there is a ton of information on the internet about these things, so I just want to separate fact from fiction for you guys.
“But before we start, a quick reminder—it’s against UN rules to keep or transport any part of a scrab. That includes teeth, eyes, and blood. Scientists are still studying these things, and they’ve regulated the transport of samples for a reason.” He fixed us with a hard stare. “I’ve heard that some recruits took trophies from their kills, and I can’t have that. The French police will be here later to collect anything you may have . . . forgotten. You can drop it off, no questions asked. Got it? Good.”
He gestured at Jayden, and a photo of a scrab appeared on the wall behind him. It was standing in the middle of a street, an overturned trashcan at its feet. It had spikes on its back and small horns that protruded from either side of its head.
“A team leader in Beijing took this photo,” Grayson said. “This is what a lot of the scrabs in Asia look like. They have spikes on the plates of the back. The entire back is basically impenetrable.”
The image changed to a more familiar scrab. Grayish skin, fangs, incredibly long claws. It was dead, half its body in a hole in the ground. Killed while it tried to come up.
“You know this one,” Grayson said. “This is what you’ll usually see in Europe, basically until you get to Russia, where you’ll see a mix of these and the Asian scrabs. As far as we know, anyway. We can’t get accurate information out of Russia, and we don’t have any teams there.” The image changed again. Another scrab, with spikes, though they were much smaller. More like little knobs. “This was taken near Moscow in 2013. So they could look like that in Russia. But it’s unlikely that Russia will open its borders anytime soon, so that’s just for your information.”
The image changed back to a familiar scrab. A very familiar scrab.
“Oh shit,” Priya breathed behind me.
It was the one that had killed Dani. It was sprawled out on its side on the concrete floor of the lobby, soft underbelly exposed.
Grayson walked closer to the wall and pointed to the scrab’s back. “Some people call these areas of scrabs skin, but they’re technically plates. See how these big squares all connect together? And these smaller clusters around its neck and down its side? Those are basically the scrab’s armor. Most of them are bulletproof, or very close to it.” He pointed to a dent in the plate on the scrab’s neck. “See this? That’s where a recruit’s bullet ricocheted off the plate and hit another recruit.”
Several people turned to look at me.
“There’s a reason you have to be cleared to use guns,” Grayson said. “Wildly shooting at a scrab will only result in human casualties. You only take the shot if you have a very clear line to its soft areas.” He pointed to the neck and underbelly. “We use blades like machetes because they’re safer for nearby civilians, and you can pierce the plates with a very sharp blade in some spots. The plates on the head often aren’t as tough, but not always. I personally like to stick them in the neck, underneath the chin. There usually aren’t any plates there, and if there are, they’re softer. This all goes for baby scrabs, too. Don’t be fooled by the small size of newly born scrabs. They have all the same plates, and they are not like other baby animals. They will rip your face off if given half the chance.”
A new photo popped up. Beside me, Zoe jumped. The scrab in the image was in a tunnel, its mouth open wide to reveal every fang.
“So you’ve seen how the scrabs come up from the ground,” Grayson said. “They construct elaborate networks of tunnels at truly amazing speeds, given their size. They work together to do this. I know you guys have probably heard that most of the tunnels in the US were discovered and filled in, but I assure you that is a lie. They construct backup tunnels. They construct backups for their backups. There is no way that our military already found all of them. I’m hopeful that the scrabs are nearly gone in the US, but if they’re not, they will still have plenty of ways to get around. We should be prepared.”
I thought of Mrs. Gonzalez, sitting on her porch every day with her gun. She was certainly prepared, though considering what Grayson had just told us, she was more likely to accidentally shoot herself or a neighbor than a scrab.
“We use drones to monitor scrab activity in several countries, including this one,” Grayson said. They capture scrabs aboveground, and we have some equipment that tracks their movements underground too. All the data goes into a program that analyzes their movements and tells us where they will appear next. It’s similar to what the US government uses to monitor terrorists. Ours is more advanced, though, if you want to know the truth.” He looked proud. “And it’s pretty accurate. So understand that when you’re assigned to a hot spot, there is a very good chance you will see action. The military tries to cut them off before they get to populated areas, but they can’t track them all. The ones that attacked us here slipped through unnoticed, and we’ll need to be there when that happens again.”
A hand in front shot up.
“Yeah, Mike,” Grayson said.
“MDG has been saying that their equipment is better than yours. Is that true?”
“No,” Grayson
