Lena wiped her tired eyes as she collapsed onto the worn-out couch, finally home after days of nonstop experiments.
The television flickered softly in the background, its glow casting dancing shadows across the room.
She wasn't even paying attention - until she heard it.
> "Breaking news - a violent outbreak is sweeping through the city. Citizens are advised to stay indoors.
Authorities are urging everyone to remain calm-"
Her heart seized.
She dropped the coffee in her hand, the cup shattering against the floor.
Her mind raced back to the lab.
To Ethan.
Without thinking, she grabbed her keys and bolted out the door, the world outside already unraveling into chaos.
---
The streets were no longer the ones she knew.
Cars were abandoned in the middle of the road, their doors swinging open.
Shattered glass glinted on the asphalt like tiny stars.
Sirens screamed in the distance.
And then -
She saw them.
The infected.
Once-human bodies, now twisted by madness, stumbled through the streets.
Their eyes were hollow, their movements jerky and wrong.
Lena's breath caught in her throat.
She pressed herself against a wall, heart hammering, watching as a group of them tore into a man who didn't even have time to scream.
Tears blurred her vision - but she wiped them away fiercely.
> "Ethan. I have to get to Ethan."
---
She moved carefully at first, sticking to the alleys, clutching a heavy metal rod she'd found near an abandoned construction site.
But it wasn't enough.
A woman - or what used to be one - lunged at her from a doorway.
Lena swung the rod with all her strength, the sickening crack of bone splitting the air.
Blood sprayed across her coat, warm and sticky.
She didn't stop.
Another one - a man in a tattered suit - rushed her.
She shoved him back with a grunt, barely ducking as he snapped his jaws at her throat.
She fought her way down the streets, battered and bruised, until the looming shadow of the lab finally appeared in the distance.
---
The lab was eerily silent.
The once-gleaming glass windows were smeared with blood.
The door hung half off its hinges.
Inside, the fluorescent lights flickered weakly, casting long, trembling shadows.
Lena stepped over broken equipment and shattered beakers, her breath catching at the sight of smeared bloody handprints along the walls.
> "Ethan..."
"Please be safe."
The main lab was a nightmare.
Tables overturned.
Papers scattered like fallen snow.
Blood everywhere.
And in the center of it all -
The shattered remains of their experiment.
The vial.
The needle.
She staggered forward, heart pounding painfully against her ribs.
It hit her like a freight train.
They had caused this.
Their experiment.
Their dream to save lives... had unleashed hell instead.
Her knees buckled, and she collapsed onto the floor, gasping for breath.
> "This can't be real."
She wiped shaking hands across her face, trying to pull herself together.
Ethan.
Where was Ethan?
A horrible thought wormed its way into her mind, sending ice down her spine.
> "Did he... did he inject himself?"
"Was he the source?"
"Is he... alive?"
"Or... or worse..."
The room spun around her.
Then she remembered.
The security cameras.
---
Her hands fumbled at the console, blood and dirt smearing the keys as she punched in the code.
The screens blinked to life, one by one, showing different parts of the lab.
Most of them showed only carnage - empty halls, broken doors, bodies.
But then -
One video.
The main lab feed.
She froze.
On the screen, she saw him.
Ethan.
Injecting himself.
Screaming.
Convulsing.
Crumpling to the ground as his body twisted in ways no human body should.
She covered her mouth, a choked sob escaping.
She watched helplessly as the janitor entered -
as Ethan, or whatever he had become, attacked without hesitation.
She couldn't breathe.
> "No no no..."
"This isn't him... this isn't Ethan..."
"I left him... I left him alone..."
"It's my fault."
Tears blurred her vision.
She curled into herself right there on the cold, bloodied floor, the horror of what she was witnessing crashing down on her all at once.
Outside, the screams of the infected filled the night.
Inside, Lena's world shattered into a million pieces.
And yet, through her broken sobs, a single, stubborn thought refused to die:
> "I have to find him."
"No matter what he's become... he's still Ethan."
"He's still mine."