The Disease.

She'd had a rough night, and all she really wanted was to lay in her apartment and get some rest. Instead here she was coming into work early on a Sunday morning because some half-wit had fritzed the server. Of course said witless wonder was probably in Church, as were most of the locals on a Sunday, leaving her to do the work.

If she'd had the energy she'd be real pissed off, but as it was she turned up the air conditioning up and slumped further into her seat in the back of the cab. The driver barely looked at her, which saved her the normal sneers the locals reserved for her "type", and she tried to loosen up her tired joints as quietly as possible. This was a shit job, one that she'd never have touched earlier in her career, but unless she could get a permit to move to another state it was the best she could hope for. Still trouble shooting office servers beat the kind of jobs most of her friends got, it they could find any work at all. And you needed all the money you could get if you were going to buy the latest drugs, for without them you'd be gone in a few months.

The taxi dropped her off at the entrance to the garage and she made her way down the ramp to the staff elevator. The owners of the business didn't wish to fall out with the town council so they did their best to look closed on the Sabbath, and of course this meant that only non-church folk could be forced to work today.

Her legs were stiff as she edged her way into the cool darkness of the car park, but the coolness seemed to help her movements. The cold didn't seem to be helping her thoughts though, which seemed particularly sluggish despite the medicine she'd taken earlier, so she dreaded the prospect of making sense of the half baked programming that ran their server.

Standing at the bank of lift doors she puzzled over the displays, trying to remember what to do, when an arm reached past her and pressed the 'call' button. She hadn't even noticed the other person approach and was fearful that she'd stood frozen for too long. These sluggish thoughts moved through her brain until the doors opened and she shuffled in.

"WORKING TODAY?" The young woman who'd called the lift spoke very slow and loud, but such were her thoughts that the girl had got off the lift before she could form a reply. The girl worked in the next office, accounts or something, she couldn't really remember.

Shuffling past silent offices it was obvious that she was the only one called in today, but unless she could get thinking then it was probable that she would not be working here much longer. She'd seen others in her situation fall apart, unable to compete in the workplace they were soon reduced to cleaning streets or delivering the mail. Once on that downward slide it was inevitable that they'd end up on the streets, where the rats and dogs waited for them. Not for her that fate, she was determined to survive this, she would never give up.

All her bravado faded away when she tried to log on, and failed. Even with the best medicine available she couldn't remember her password. She knew she was beaten, there was no hope left.

She must have sat there for half an hour, watching that flashing cursor, unable to formulate a guess as to what her password might be. She'd probably have sat there 'til Monday morning but for the sound of footsteps in the corridor. There was the sound of a hand blower, probably from the washroom.

A thought tried to form in her muddled mind, but all she could manage was that she should use the washroom. It had been a while since she'd been in this room, as since she'd become one of the "afflicted" she'd largely shunned her own image. But it wasn't only the image of the gaunt figure that shuffled in the mirrors above the wash basins, it was the looks of disgust or worse, pity, that she saw in those she encountered. Before, she'd spent hours in places like this, "doing her face", trying for "the look". Now all she could manage was trying to add some colour to her lifeless skin. She was glad to be alone now as she contemplated what little future she'd have when they found out she couldn't do her job anymore.

She stood facing the mirrors, unable to see the once beautiful woman who stood there. She imagined herself not in her charcoal business suite, but in rags. Her still clear skin would soon be ravaged and scarred by the rats that preyed on those forced to sleep in the alleys. If she could have she'd have cried, but that ability was one more thing this disease had stolen from her.

Gradually she became aware that she was not alone anymore. The girl from the lift was back again, rubbing at something in the sink. Unthinkingly she shuffled closer, making the girl look up.

"Toner .. on my blouse" Dark thoughts stirred in the depths of her mind as she watched the girls lips move, not really understanding the words, she followed a drip of water as it made it's way down a baby smooth cheek. The girl took her vacant attention to be understanding and continued. "Can't use hot water see.." she was rubbing at a black smudge on her sleeve, and slowly the stain faded. Not getting any further reaction the girl ignored her as if she was a piece of furniture.

It's possible that her face would have betrayed what was about to happen, but she'd never really know as the girl had turned her back to her, and she was lost watching a strand of hair that fell from the back of the girl's page boy cut, sliding down that oh so enticing neck and disappeared beneath the soft collar of her white blouse. If she'd been able to think then she wouldn't have wanted this, but some dark instinct drove her body now.

She knocked the smaller girl forward, who instinctively tried to right herself, bringing the back of her head into rough contact with teeth that closed on the soft neck with bone popping force. As she sucked up the blood the young girl screamed, face distorted by fear when her gnawing teeth pierced the fragile skull. She was unaware of the struggle, too focused on the taste of blood and brains that filled her mouth, and when the girls struggles ceased she continued her feeding. She still wasn't conscious of what she was doing, the spinal fluid that she sucked from crushed vertebrae taking time to have any effect on her torpid mind. Time didn't register, just the fact that she'd run out of the best nourishment that the girl had to offer. Still she continued, as having chewed out the contents of the young girls skull and demolished her spinal column she rolled the now silent girl onto her back. Apart from blood that seeped from the girls hair she looked almost untouched from this side, from the front her slightly dishevelled blouse didn't even hint at the devastation caused when her spine was ripped out and eaten. But once again she fell on the unresisting girl, sucking out those pale blue eyes and the optic nerves they concealed, then tearing into those soft nerve filled lips she ripped off the fine jaw to eat the soft tongue within.

At some point she started to think again, the wash of neurones reactivating her own tired mind until she was thinking more clearly than she'd ever done before. And one of the first thoughts that crossed her newly invigorated mind was how she was going to explain the gory body parts that lay scattered around the washroom. For in her efforts to consume neural tissue she'd reduced the young accounts assistant to an unrecognisable collection of chewed up meat and splintered bones. Indeed if it wasn't for the shreds of clothing that were entangled in the remains no one would have thought this might once have been a living, breathing young woman.

Her newly awoken mind now moved with lightening speed as she stripped out of her own blood soaked suit and washed the girls blood off, taking care to remove the flesh from between her teeth and nails. She knew where the cleaners kept their spare uniforms, so slipping barefoot into the silent office she planned her next actions, leaving the washroom to the cleaning bots that came out as soon as she'd left the washroom 'empty'.

All her expensive medicines had tried to recreate the effect of what she'd just eaten, each potion trying to delay the 'unstoppable' deterioration that some claimed was the inevitable consequences of 'the disease'. But it seemed they couldn't compete with the traditional remedies, as nothing kept a zombie going like a good dose of brains.