First encounter

The Reed family history and the greater details were not mentioned all that much in the novel Brick had read but he did know more than enough from his inherited knowledge from the original owner of the body.

The Reed family were a high class family which lead a food production, packaging and distribution business with many spread out in other cities.

There were two sons who were born into the family with a couple of relatives from other distant family lines but those people had little involvement with the family business.

The eldest son inherited the business from his parents while the youngest son got some minor shares and money which was enough to allow him to live a carefree life.

The company was running and expanding well under the direction of the eldest son, the eldest son got married to a woman who saved him from an accident and lost their memories.

They had a daughter and lived happy lives until tragedy struck and took them away, since the daughter could not run the business and take care of herself, the legal guardian became the youngest son who had a daughter of his own.

What most did not know and was kept hidden was that he cheated the daughter out of her inheritance rights when she was still too young and naive to understand what she was signing.

On the surface he had created a good image of himself to the public so they did not notice anything strange.

Lucy did not rebel or show any signs of abuse so even those that were aware of everything decided to let things be as they were since she was able to live a normal life without having to worry about being abused or starving on the streets.

Lucy did not live in the main house but was instead assigned a smaller house nearby on the Reed residence, it was better than what the workers were assigned so she did not have to suffer too much.

Shane Reed was the current owner and CEO of the Reed businesses while Tanya Reed became the young miss of the Reed household name.

From the memories obtained from the original owner, Tanya picked Brick up from an orphanage and sponsored him which was either an act of kindness or a publicity stunt.

It did not matter which of them was the truth because it would not change Brick's attachment to her which lead to him protecting her during the first lifetime and the time during the novel after Lucy had regressed.

Brick already had a faint idea that it would not be so easy for him once the apocalypse came but upon diving deeper into the details of the original owner, he found out that the young miss would not be at home when the outbreak happened.

The chaos and the distractions prevented Shane from noticing that Lucy had already slipped out of the family residence early in the morning so he would not notice until much later.

He believed her to be dead until they were reunited later when Lucy had already gained a little more power and an ally.

Upon hearing the door being hit from outside, Brick grabbed an axe then heard a hurried voice. "Open quickly. Please."

The voice sounded urgent and fearful so Brick was able to figure out that an outbreak had happened within walls of the Reed family residence.

He took a quick breath then unlocked and opened the door quickly after checking outside the door.

A man in his early twenties fell inside and scrambled to his feet to get inside then Brick slammed the door closed.

The man was panting and slightly pale. "Thank you.. you took your time though."

There were banging noises which followed shortly after so Brick put his finger to his mouth to signal the other party.

He then came closer and lowered his voice. "Were you bitten or scratched? Show me your body."

The other party showed hesitation and argued. "W..what do you mean show you my body?"

Brick pointed the axe towards him and warned. "Do it quickly, I do not want you bringing danger to me. Are you infected or not? I need you to keep quiet or those things will not leave anytime soon. How many are outside?"

Brick recognised the man because he was the person who had harmed the original owner of the body in a training exercise so Brick's impression of him was already quite poor.

The man went pale. "Alright.. there are two."

After examining the body for wounds, Brick let out a sigh of relief then he threw over some magazines and some duct tape. "Wrap those around your arms to provide you a little protection and grab anything that can be used as a weapon. Has the armoury been touched yet?"

The man finally calmed down and replied. "Only the captain and the house owner have the key to it but I think they are all held up in the inner walls."

In the family residence, there were walls and gates to stop trespassers then there was another around the main building where the family lived.

Most of the people who worked inside lived in the buildings inside the outer walls while those in higher positions had already been safe within the inner protection while attempting to deal with any problems that appeared among them.

Most of the lower workers were forced to defend themselves in the early stages and the armoury was the best place to go to if the situation in the outer walls needed to be solved quickly.

Brick calmly told the man. "We need to work together if we want to survive so follow my orders."

The man responded. "Why should I follow your orders? I outrank you?"

Brick shrugged and rolled his eyes. "None of that should matter now, what matters is that we carry out everything according to plan so we can get out of here then make this place safer. We cannot rely on the others to solve this right away."

He started to tell his plan quickly then when there was movement of the zombies gaining a little distance from the door, the man had opened the door a little and started banging onto it with his fist.

The two zombies which were nearby were attracted to the noise and headed towards the gap where the door had been opened.

"Uuuuh."

"Hrr."

Their movements were slower and stiffer than ordinary humans so Brick was able to watch them approach from within without panicking them he signalled towards the man.

The man leaned against the door which slammed it shut onto the zombie and trapped it in place.

Brick was quick to get close and the axe aimed for the head of the zombie, he pulled at it a little to turn the head and a knife in his other hand stabbed towards the temple which caused it to become limp.

Another noise came from outside as the other walked and banged into the door which caused the man to struggle a little more since he could not close the door with the corpse being stuck in between.

The zombie tried to claw its way inside and through the other zombie with all its might which caused the man to become more afraid.

The door was pushed open due to his lack of focus and because he had lost a lot of his strength from the terror he experience from the zombies and the action of Brick killing the first one.

The zombie stumbled in and fell over the corpse then set its target as Brick and ignored the trembling man hiding behind the other side of the open door.

Just as an opening was created and it was distracted, the man slipped past and ran outside of the house in fear which left Brick alone with the remaining zombie.

Brick looked at the wooden pole at the side which had been sharpened and then sighed. "He dropped the weapon.. what a fool. Well.."

The zombie was getting closer but Brick turned over the wooden table and pushed it with his body towards the zombie which pinned it against the wall while his axe swung wildly toward the exposed head and arm which were still within his reach.

The zombie stopped moving so he released the force he applied onto the table then dragged the corpses out of the way of the door then closed it.

There was a shriek of terror and pain which followed nearby then there was knocking which followed hurriedly but the knocking was interrupted by the wails of the man and the sounds of moaning and crunching until the man finally became silent.

The sound of moans from the zombies outside only increased after the man had become a zombie after his death.