Bedlam (IV)
After a short while, Elizabeth proclaims herself satisfied. “That was great!”
She hops down from your back, apparently well enough to move on her own. While you haven’t lost enough blood to affect you, you cast her a puzzled look. She is licking her lips clean of your blood, as if there was nothing strange at all about her sucking from your neck.
“Are you alright?” you ask, slowly, not knowing how to broach the subject.
Elizabeth speeds up to match your pace, walking besides you. “Never felt better! It’s like… like I’m finally awake at long last. I feel so alive!” She makes a show of punching the air with left and right jabs, giggling.
That giggle turns into an excited peal of girlish laughter as she spots another transformed beast turning the corner in front of you. From the tattered green uniform, you can tell it used to be an orderly, someone like you. Before you or the beast can react, she streaks towards it, her red hair trailing in her wake. Elizabeth’s fingers plunge deep into the former orderly’s belly and rips it apart. Blood and viscera spatter all over her and she wrinkles her nose over the dying monster. “Okay, now this stinks. Yours was better.” She giggles again.
The last time Elizabeth was excitably violent and giggly, she was drunk at the village’s harvest festival. Granted, she was not anywhere near as violent as she is now back then, but perhaps it is only a matter of scale. Or a matter of what she imbibed. Given the timing, it almost seems as if she has gotten drunk off your blood.
She bats her eyelashes at you slowly and exaggeratedly. “Oh, would you mind if I had some more-“
“No.” You reflexively place your hand over your neck and shake your head. “We need to hurry.”
“Mm, you’re no fun. Fine, let’s go get Rain,” she sighs.
It does not take long until you reach the room where Rain usually stays while you are on the night shift. Opening the door, you are greeted with a gruesome sight.
Not all of the hospital’s inhabitants had been turned into monsters. A nurse lies dead on the floor, her face half eaten, her throat ripped out and her guts spilled. Her ribcage has been caved in and cracked open. The floor is almost black, stained with clotted blood.
“You’re late!” With that as your sole warning, Rain drops down from a cubby-hole in the ceiling and lands right in your arms. Looking at the dead nurse sadly, she says, “Lisa let me hide up there. Then, they broke in.”
You nod silently. Despite the harrowing experience, Rain doesn’t seem any worse for the wear. Just then, Rain notices Elizabeth and her face brightens up. “Lizzie!”
“Heya!” grins Elizabeth in return. Her incisors don’t seem to be any longer than usual… you think.
“You seem better now! That’s good!”
The two girls seem to be in good spirits despite the hell that must be unfolding in the rest of the hospital… better than you are, at least. You close your eyes, take a deep breath, and focus. For now, your priority is to make sure they survive this. Consulting the map you have, you try to determine the next best course of action.
***
A. You try to escape through the front gates. It is the shortest and most direct path you have out of the hospital. You might run into more of the turned, but you can handle them.
B. You try to escape through the back gates. While the route is longer, you will have more cover and places to conceal yourself on the way there.
C. You bunker down in your current position. An incident like this will not stay hidden for long – there will be a response from the Hunters in the city. You just have to wait until they arrive.
