"Barton."
Dean paced to Barton's side, his face full of concern. "Are you alright?"
Barton looked at Dean with a vacant gaze, delayed by several seconds, before he finally managed to stammer, "Uhm... uhm uhm..."
Perhaps it was Dean's hypnosis that interrupted the mutation process.
Barton's condition was now much better than that of his previous teammate. Although there was a noticeable decline in his intelligence and his reactions were sluggish, he was still able to respond to external movements and retained a certain level of cognition; it was just as if he had lost the ability to speak...
Besides that, the most severe change in Barton's appearance was in his eyes.
His sclera had enlarged considerably, streaked with scattered blood vessels. His pupils, squeezed by the whites of his eyes, were nearly invisible, indicating that Barton now had very poor light perception. His once-agile iris had shrunk significantly.
