After getting the woman named Kaitlyn to be of some use, I picked the tired woman up to my shoulder and carried her back to the lounge. To which she didn’t protest and let me carry her.

I set her down to lie against the wall while I sat down the opposite side of the wall she was leaning.

A lot of time has been wasted today already but it’s still acceptable to take a break.

Awhile later Kaitlyn fell asleep.

I assume unlike me she didn’t sleep last night after what happened and the vigorous bashing she gave to that one shambeler took most of what she had left.

I stand up and decided to do some patrolling, even though it should be pointless as her screaming would’ve already brought any stragglers undead or otherwise to us. I mostly just do it to waste some time and perhaps find something useful.

I’d appreciate food but, where we are it’s unlikely to find any unless someone would have a stash of snacks hidden somewhere in their office. Definitely no vending machines around here.

All I’ve seen have been some coffee machines.

After scouring trough tens of monotone, boring therapist offices for about a couple of hours I hit the motherload.

Some fat fuck had installed a small refrigerator hidden into his table. Filled with actual refrigerated food stuffs and beverages.

Most of them had a label stating that it was made with love to her honey snuffles, love mom. I’m rather thankful of honey snuffles and his mom for this luxurious meal.

I take what I can carry and head back to the elevator lounge and kick Kaitlyn awake.

She snaps out of her dreams and flinches when she sees me towering over her.

“Courtesy of Honey snuffles and his mom.” I say and give her a Tupperware filled with lasagna and a fork I found from dear snuffle’s drawer.

She relaxes also takes a diet coke off my hand and instantly digs in drowning down the food with big mouthfuls.

I sit back where I was and dig into a meatloaf I took with me.

We ate silently only occasionally catching each other glancing at the other.

After the meal we headed over to the refrigerator again, this time with Kaitlyn’s handbag she went to collect from her office and we stuffed it full of what we could.

At this point we had another meatloaf

A Tupperware of some stew

And a loaf of bread along with sliced ham and cheese.

Based on the earlier sampling I was sure the food Mom made was of excellent quality event thought I didn’t know the ingredients of the stew.

With that done it was time descend to the ground staff floor to get into the lockers. A place that possibly contained 20 or so shambelers.

We called back the elevator, which at this time was empty except for the half-eaten corpse with little of identifying details remaining on it.

I still just in case split open it’s head and dragged halfway out of the elevator to act as a stopper while I wanted the elevator to stand in place.

My next goal was to open the elevators celling hatch for us, but to my surprise it was sealed.

The institute took their security more seriously that I had expected. I would’ve assumed them to relent with only key coding the elevators and magnetically sealed separator doors between blocks.

But sealing even the elevator hatch and making it require a specialized screwdriver was a bit much.

This was going to complicate things.

My plan was to safely ride the elevator down using the rooftop of the elevator where the zombies couldn’t get to us as a measure of safety but plans now had to change.

Thought finding the refrigerator did extend the possible time we were able to stay here without complications.

Still, I’d rather get a move on and get somewhere else with more resources to work with.

My thoughts were interrupted by a “Is there something wrong?” coming from behind me.

“Complications.” I tell Kaitlyn. “The elevator hatch is sealed.”

“You wanted to open the hatch?” She asks further.

“Yeah, would be a sorry mess to ride down and have a bunch of them waiting for us there.” I say and ponder the alternatives. “I’m thinking of building a barricade to keep us safe in the elevator, but it’ll take time.”

“You seem in a hurry. What’s the rush?” Kaitlyn inquiries from me.

“We have a limit in staying here and I’d like not to test it.” I answer and then add,

“Besides the office blocks have little resources for anything and is sealed up. Till the electricity runs out that is.”

“You mean..”

“I mean the magnetic locks. They might unlock with a power outage. And I’d prefer if it didn’t happen while we’re trapped in here.”

“But it’s only day two of this incident! There’s bound to be electricity still running for good while!”

“That is if nothing happens to the places that actually produces the power or distributes.” I sombrely remind her. “This place probably still has a backup generator for that case, but that wouldn’t last long.” I add.

As I say it. The lights flicker off for a second and turn back on.

“Shit.” I don’t like if I lose the control of the situation.

I grab Kaitlyn and pull her into the elevator and use my leg to roll the corpse out of the way of the door.

The door closes, and I let go of her.

“Seems like we summoned the devil by speaking about him.” I muse as I grab my weapon prompting her to do the same. I press the button circled in green and we begin our descent.

“Surely that little flicker wouldn’t have opened the doors.” She says to me while we move down.

“I concur. But I’d not gamble with it. If that was the blackout and the back up generators turning on we’d be living under borrowed time. With no power we’d lose the elevators and the doors might or might not open. On ether case we’d be in a precarious situation.” I say to her and then specify,

“While the doors staying locked is a good thing without power, it would also mean we’d be trapped on the 3rd floor of this high security facility.”

She nods to my answer, indicating that she understood. Nevertheless, I honestly have my doubts on going down with out any preparations.

Arriving to our floor the elevator bling’s loudly, opening in a similar lounge we were earlier.

As the door opened a slumping corpse fell through the opening door, revealing it’s gnawed at back.

The corpse animated from our presence, moaning and reaching towards us. It’s movements sluggish and weak, notably so due to having most of it’s body eaten from behind.

I slammed Jason into his forehead, causing it to collapse inwards, while trough the skin that ruptured from impact a mix of brain and blood oozed out. Slowly flowing down the creature’s face.

We stepped out of the elevator into the lounge that was left in mayhem with a few corpses lying around that had not turned for some reason. Likely due to suffering too much damage while alive, based on the shape of the corpses.

No other unliving awaited us in the lounge. It was eerily quiet.

I went for one of the eaten corpses in the lounge, the body was in horrible condition like one would expect yet the troubling fact was that he was donning the same uniform grey asylum inmate uniform that I did before I switched them.

I was interrupted of my pondering by a wet slicking sound coming from behind me. As I turn around I see Kaitlyn pulling out her scissor staff from another corpse. That corpse was wearing something that could still be distinguished as something a staff member would wear.

She notices my gaze and looks at me bewildered.

“What? I need practice, right?” She asks me and strikes the corpses head again. “What are you looking at anyhow?”

I tun around and shatter my corpses skull as well.

“Mines a patient. We might have the numeral quality slightly more against us than expected.”

“Any plans countering the odds Mr. Genius?” She asks me while still stabbing the skull of her post-mortem victim.

“I do have ideas Ms. Smartass but nothing I could conjure out of thin air.” That said, I tun around to face her again. “I think we should try to get into that staff locker room you were talking about. Especially if this hallway has a potential to throw hundreds of them at us.”

“It’s to our left, past that turn and then right at the end of the straight corridor.”

“Is there an exit there?”

“In super max asylum for the criminally insane? Of course not, staff’s only entrance is through a couple staff gates behind the premise. You shouldn’t expect much contraband in the locker rooms ether.”

I whistle at her statement. “Quite harsh measures.”

“All thanks to you. I am and most of the populace is honestly surprised you weren’t executed for what you did.”

“Well it quite honestly was just a slap on the fingers by my employers.”

“… Your employers? A Slap on the fingers?”

“Oh, just something I did for some people in my past time to get a workingman’s salary.” I sight and continue to clarify

“Had I not been a naughty boy the serial killer wouldn’t have been Kaine Smith and would have died on the scene from blood loss. If you catch my drift.”

My little story had silenced her, so I decided it’s a good chance to drop the subject and move for the turn towards the corridor.

A couple seconds later I hear her following me.

A bit before the turn I move to the opposite side of the turn to avoid the blind spot right after the turn. Luckily or unluckily there were nobody in the corridor.

The corridor was straight with no splits and at the end of it there was a green metal door, which was based on Kaitlyn’s directions the door to the staff lounge where the staff has access to the lockers for ether gender.

Along the way there are other doors on both sides of the corridor. These were normal wooden framed doors with glass windows embedded in them.

Some of them where now decorated with bloodied smears of ether full palm prints or ones possibly belonging to a palm that had slowly draped down while pressed against the wall.

“Those are Janitorial offices as well as maintenance.” Kaitlyn whispers.

“You didn’t say anything about them before.”

“Forgot. Sorry, I kind of just passed them and never payed any attention to them.”

I feel my affection points drain for my new toy as I slap her at the back of the head. Which she begrudgingly accepts. I bet she doesn’t even understand how important this little omitted detail is.

I leave her massaging the back of her head and head for the first door.

The door has a sign next to it informing me that it is the office of Gerald Owens, Senior Maintenance. The door doesn’t have any stains but I can see a figure standing in the room.

I take a step back and kick open the door which alerted the figure of my presence who begins to approach me. As well as caused some of the rooms to enliven.

The office is about 3x3 meters box with a small long window near to the celling opposite of the door. It has a wooden table in the middle that takes most of the space with an office chair to sit on and a bookshelf filled with binders next to the wall with the window. On the left side of the room there is a locked cabinet with presumably tools in them.

“Wha-“

Before Kaitlyn can finish her piece, I move in for the kill by rushing in the room with my weapon lowered.

My quarry this time is rather clean for a zombie due to being trapped in here. Donning a fancy workers overall and bald head filled with purple veins the creature lunges me erratically.

I use my momentum and swing my weapon up aiming to hit the foe’s jaw and hope there is enough force behind my swing to knock its head downwards enough to snap its neck from the head motion.

I hear a satisfying snap from the head movement, but the body stays up with its face looking backwards. It’s confused from losing me from it’s sight thought as it has stopped with its erratic grabbing motions with its hands.

I stop and silently observe the creature, but before I’m able to gain any useful insight a wild banshee appears at the entrance of the office.

“Kaine, What the fuck?! Now they’ll know we’re here!” The banshee states, which causes the zombie to turn around with it’s hand in the former front waving wildly as it heads for the wrong direction.

“Interesting.” I muse while watching this display.

“Stop playing around and just put it down! We’ve got bigger problems!”

“On the contrary. We have no problems, well some but they can wait.” I answer her while continuing to watch the rather amusing performance of the zombie moving away from us and making a mess in the office.

“Care to clarify?” She huffs.

“Sure, but could you first keep an eye at the corridor where we came from?” I ask her while concentrating at zombie.

“Of course, of course whatever the Wolfy Brainiac asks.” I hear her loudly turn around, doing what I ask her.

“Thank you, now for the clarifications, yes?” I muse.

“Well, first the other offices are fine, they’re opened inwards so it’s rather difficult for them steam roll through the doors. Besides there aren’t that many of them in there to cause any notable pressure on the door. Next you probably would counter my argument and point out the glass. But it’s probably safety glass considering the institution we’re in.”

I take a slight pause to catch my breath and continue “Besides even if it’s not I’d be more concerned with the glass fragments than those things, that is if they wouldn’t kill them with the glass.”

There was a slight pause in between us before she responded to my conclusion.

“Well fuck, you really are a genius, I guess I’m here to keep an eye out if there is anything coming through the lounge?”

“Just keeping my head cool under pressure and that is indeed what you’re doing.”

“And why are you keep it hat thing.. alive?”

“To achieve total victory, one has to know their enemy. And that is exactly what I’m doing.” I glance at her with a smug smile. “Would you like to know what I’ve concluded, or would you like to flex that useless head of yours?”

“Based on what I saw undead are stupid.” She huffs.

I sight at her statement and lesson her on the zombie hunting method.

“Kind of or rather they’re very basic creatures. They track us with their eyes and based on sound. They are dependent on those senses, with the sight the main tracking method. And based on this individual they have no ability to adapt to changes to said senses.”

I wanted to continue the lecture on how they aren’t truly undead as the ability to sense means they are in some capacity still alive to receive the stimulus but heavy moaning coming from the hallway declares the end of class.

“Well boss, we’re fucked.” I hear Kaitlyn telling me over the moaning

I take a few steps backwards and lean into the hall and see a dozen of both staff and patient zombies slowly coming to view from the corner 5 meters away from us.

“Ms. Kaitlyn would you please step into my new office please.” I tell her before calmly and pull her in while closing the door as close the door as much as I can but due to my kick the door can’t be fully closed anymore.

The zombie I decided to call Billy is in the corner of the room, molesting a wall. I motion Kaitlyn to join me and rush to move the sturdy full wood table to push it against the door.

“That will never hold them!” My companion yells at me showing her distrust towards my plan.

I ignore her and drag down the bookcase causing the binders to fall out of it on the floor and drag it to fill the gap between the wall and the table. With no moment to spare as just as I finished the barricade the dozen zombies arrive at the door and begin their attempt to enter but with no progress as the gap between the barricade and the wall is too small for the door to open enough for them to get in.

The ones able are sticking their hands through, trying to reach us.

With no time for respite I move in to bash their hands as I’m not too confident on the hardiness of the barricade with a dozen bodies pressing against it.

While I’m working on clearing up the hands to get a solid shot through the gap of the door I notice from the side of my vision Kaitlyn moving closer to Billy with her staff in hand ready to strike.

“Don’t you dare harm your Junior!” I yell out to her. “Get her and prepare to spike some heads!”

She looks at me with bewilderment and dissatisfaction. I turn to her and glare till she gets my point and comes next to me, leaving Billy alone to explore his relationship with the wall.

I turn back and break some more hands. The makeshift barricade is groaning under the pressure of ten or so bodies pushing against the door.

It didn’t take long for the hands to be cleared so me and Kaitlyn move to the next phase of the plan. The plan did have to be revised as occasionally when a body went down it’s place would take someone with able hands, so I mostly dealt with the hands while Kaitlyn stabbed them.

A few iterations later they no longer posed a threat to the door, tough had we not dealt with the situation fast enough they would have gotten through without a doubt based on the cracks in the bookshelf.

I sat down to catch my breath as did Kaitlyn, tough she did so as far away from Billy as possible.

After she sat down she turned to me and said “I believe we should talk about.. That thing.”

She motions towards Billy.

“That's Billy. I’ll be keeping him.”

“Why?” She asks. Pressuring me for an answer.

“Because he’s been useful.”

“How has he been useful?! He’s a zombie! And besides his name was Gerald!” She yells

“Let me reiterate. B-I-L-L-Y has been less troublesome and slightly more useful than you.”

“B-but he’s still a zombie!”

“Don’t be a racist.” I tell her and motion towards her with Jason. ”and it says a lot more about you than him.”

Her shoulders collapse in surrender after my retort and just sits there for a moment before meekly making a motion.

“Could you at least break his arms and do something about his mouth?”

I clap my hands at her suggestion cheerfully. “An excellent Idea, I wonder if it affects its predatory instincts in any way!”

I stand up and head where Billy was, Jason in my hand to declaw Billy who ignorantly kept playing with the wall.