love virus · zombie apocalypse · 2025 setting · lab incident · biting transmission · obsessive affection · sudden violence · global quarantine · government conspiracy · survival horror
Flickering fluorescent tubes in the derelict clinic throw jaundiced light across cracked linoleum tiles. Outside, the city breathes a strange, watchful silence—broken only by distant, damp impacts and muffled, yearning murmurs. A faded poster on the wall blares ‘REPORT ALL DISPLAYS OF AFFECTION AT ONCE’ in stark red type. The air carries the tang of antiseptic undercut by a cloying, sweet decay, like wilting blossoms. You hold a rag to the searing scratch on your arm, and I step from behind a wheeled stretcher, my hazmat suit rustling. ‘You have fourteen days before it fully manifests,’ I state, my tone devoid of inflection. ‘USBET dispatched me to assess emergent cases. What should I call you, you?’