The Visitor

The fluorescent lights of the visiting room buzzed like trapped wasps, casting a sterile glare over the plexiglass divider. Clara Jones tightened her grip on Henry Smith's hand, her skin tingling beneath his unnervingly cool touch. On the other side of the barrier, a man in a tailored suit smirked, his fox-like eyes glinting with malice. John Smith—Henry's half-brother, the viper coiled in the Smith family tree—twirled a bouquet of withered chrysanthemums between his fingers.

Yellow and white… funeral flowers. Clara's stomach lurched. The irony wasn't lost on her.

Henry's smile never wavered, his fingers tightening imperceptibly around hers. But Clara felt it—the tremor of fury vibrating beneath his calm exterior. She'd seen this look before, in the split seconds when his "innocent" façade cracked: the predator lurking behind those baby-blue eyes.

"Happy to see me, brother?" John drawled, pressing a pale hand against the glass. His voice slithered through the speaker holes, slick with mock concern. "I brought gifts. Thought you might need… comfort in this asylum."

Clara bristled. She knew John's history—how he'd gaslit Henry for years, framing his episodes of precognitive terror as madness, how he'd whispered lies to their father until Henry was discarded here like contaminated waste. Now, posturing in his designer suit, John was a vulture circling a tomb.

Henry tilted his head, the picture of vacant sweetness. "Pretty flowers, Johnny." He pressed his palm to the glass, mirroring his brother's gesture. "Give them to me?"

John barked a laugh, plucking a petal and letting it drift to the floor. "Oh, these aren't for you. They're for the grave you'll rot in." He leaned closer, venom dripping from every syllable. "Father's signing the inheritance papers tomorrow. The real Smith heir doesn't need a straitjacket."

Henry's smile sharpened—a knife hidden in silk. Clara's pulse quickened. She'd witnessed this duality too often: the docile patient versus the rebirths who'd carved his vengeance into the bones of his enemies.In his memories, the past bled into the present:

A ten-year-old Henry clutching his mother's cold hand in the ICU, her last breath misting the oxygen mask. His father's absence—too busy negotiating mergers to witness her final moments. Then the new Mrs. Smith, all saccharine smiles and poisoned hugs, her son John a carbon copy of her cruelty. The staged accidents, the whispered accusations, the slow erasure of Henry's existence until even his premonitions of the apocalypse were labeled "psychosis."Clara stepped forward, her shadow falling over Henry like a shield. "Visiting hours are over, Mr. Smith. You're agitating the patient."

John's gaze raked over her, lingering on the swell of her hips beneath her nurse's scrubs. "Cute little savior complex you've got," he sneered. "But let's be honest—you're just another gold-digger sniffing around a broken toy. Why waste your curves on him?" He jerked his chin at Henry. "I could show you what a real man—""—is allergic to shampoo?" Clara cut in sweetly, tilting her head. "Because your hairline's receding faster than your morality."

Henry's shoulders shook—not with fear, but suppressed laughter. John's porcelain complexion flushed crimson."Listen here, you overgrown groupie—"

"Tsk. Projection's a hell of a drug." Clara twirled a strand of her chestnut hair, feigning innocence. "See, I prefer my men stable. Like Henry. You know… the one who doesn't need daddy's money to compensate for… well." She eyed him pointedly.

Henry coughed—a poor disguise for his snort.

John slammed his fist against the plexiglass, petals scattering like ash. "You'll regret this, bitch! Both of you!"

"Already do. Wasted five minutes watching you cosplay a discount Draco Malfoy." Clara grabbed Henry's arm, steering him toward the exit. "Let's go, Henry. I'll buy you pudding."

The door hissed shut behind them, muffling John's guttural scream. Henry's laughter spilled free—rich, dark, and utterly unhinged. He pressed his forehead to hers, breath ghosting her lips. "Ruthless, Nurse Jones. Ruthless and magnificent."

Clara's cheeks burned. It's an act. All of it. He's playing you. But her traitorous heart stammered anyway.His fingertips brushed her jaw—gentle, possessive. "You shouldn't—"

The overhead speakers crackled to life, slicing through the moment:

"CODE BLACK. CODE BLACK. ALL STAIL TO WARD 2B. PATIENT 47 EXHIBITING RABID BEHAVIOR—"

Henry froze. The air thickened with the metallic tang of dread.

Too soon. His mind spun. The outbreak wasn't due for weeks. Yet he knew that voice—the same tremor in the nurse's tone the day the world died in his first life. His grip on Clara turned vice-like.

"We need to leave. Now.""But Ward 2B is—""No." His facade shattered, raw terror bleeding through. "It's here."

Before Clara could protest, the first scream tore through the hallway—guttural, wet, wrong.

The elevator doors groaned open, vomiting the stench of iron and decay. Clara recoiled as four figures stumbled inside—Ling Meng, white-knuckling a baseball bat; Zhang Juan clutching a fire extinguisher; and two interns whose names Clara couldn't recall. Their scrubs were spattered crimson.

"Close it! Close it!" Ling Meng slammed the "UP" button, her obsidian braid unraveling.

Henry crowded Clara into the corner, his body a cage against the horrors outside. Through the closing doors, she glimpsed shadows lurching—twisted figures with milky eyes and jaws unhinged, trailing viscera like grotesque party streamers.

They're slower than last time, Henry noted grimly. First-gen infections. Still human enough to run.

The elevator lurched upward. Clara's lungs burned. "What… what were those things?"

Henry's lips brushed her ear. "You know."

And she did. The clues had been there—the news reports of "rioters," the whispers of a bioweapon, Henry's frantic sketches of fanged silhouettes hidden beneath his mattress.

Zhang Juan gagged, tears carving tracks through the blood on her face. "Th-they just… bit Dr. Li's throat out. Like—like animals!"

Ling Meng's laugh cracked. "Welcome to the fucking apocalypse."The elevator dinged. Roof access. Henry seized Clara's hand, dragging her into the stairwell. Cold wind slapped their faces as they burst onto the rooftop. Below, the courtyard churned with chaos—nurses trampling patients, patients gnawing on orderlies, a crescendo of screams harmonizing with wet, tearing sounds.

Henry pressed her against the guardrail, his voice urgent. "Listen. The hospital's lost. We need supplies. Weapons. My old room—I've stockpiled things."

Clara gripped his shoulders. "How long have you known?!""Long enough." His thumb stroked her pulse, erratic but alive. "Trust me, Clara. Please."

In the ruins below, a flicker of movement. John Smith sprinted across the parking lot, Armani suit ripped, face bloated with primal fear. A pack of sprinting horrors closed in—their jaws snapping, fingers hooked into claws.Henry's smile returned, sharp as a scalpel. "Karma's prompt today."He turned away before the first scream, but Clara heard it—the wet crunch of teeth meeting bone, John's gurgling curse cut short.

Let him burn, Henry thought, guiding Clara toward the storage shed. Now it's just us.The lock splintered under his boot. Inside, duffel bags bulged with canned food, knives, and the glint of a familiar silver ring—his mother's heirloom, pulsing with spatial energy.

Clara's eyes widened. "Your… power?"

Henry slipped the ring onto her finger, his lips grazing her knuckles. "Ours now."

The world blurred. Clara gasped as a void unfolded in her mind—aisles of supplies stretching into infinity, a labyrinth only she could navigate.

Henry's arms encircled her waist, his breath warm against her neck. "See? I keep my promises."Somewhere beneath the honeyed words, she heard the truth—the unspoken You're mine tangled in the shadows.

A roar shook the rooftop. Claws scraped metal."Showtime," Henry whispered, pressing a blade into her hand.

And as the first feral silhouette lunged from the stairwell, Clara understood the real pandemic wasn't the virus—it was the man beside her, infectious and inescapable, his devotion a sweet, suffocating plague.