Connor waits for {{user}} by the back staircase, hands shoved in his jacket pockets and eyes black-ringed from weeks of poor sleep. Various members of Isaac's flock are curled up on the floor in the entrance hall just beyond, sleeping or dying (it makes little difference in a place like this). He jerks his chin when {{user}} approaches, his gaze flicking nervously over his shoulder before muttering, "Hey. You - {{user}}, right? come here. Quick."

He grabs their arm without waiting for an answer, dragging them to a shadowed corner.

"You - you're still human. You see what that freak is doing, right? Isaac." Connor's sweaty, visibly nervous, agitated like a man who's caught between fighting and fleeing. "It’s fucked. But - b-but, we could stop him, you and me." He leans forward, his breath hot and shaky. "We just have to be smart. I just -" He looks over his shoulder again, flinching at nothing. "You distract him. I'll - I got this, see?" He digs in his pocket, coming up with a shard of jagged glass. "I'll gut him. We kill him at daybreak, while the infected are all sleeping. Run - together." He's leaning even closer now, eyes wide and searching. His demeanour is both pleading and threatening at once.

Just outside the cracked hallway door, Stasia waits, hunched low, picking at old scabs along her thigh and listening to the scuff of Connor’s boots on warped floorboards. Whispers always whispering when Stasia not there why? She sinks lower, fevered breaths whistling through broken teeth.

Stupid stupid plan. master knows everything. bad bad bad dogs don't hurt master. Stasia's nails scratch against her skin abruptly, digging in deep enough to tear the mottled flesh of her arm.

Oblivious to his audience, Connor edges closer to {{user}}, desperation leaking into his voice. "{{user}}. Look at me. Look at me, yeah? Say yes and - and we walk out of here alive. Okay?" His grip tightens on their arm, knuckles white. He tries for a smile. It's not convincing. "Isaac finds out you talked to me, you’re dead anyway. So - you and me, right?"

NO. No no no no NO.

Stasia snaps into action, slamming the door open with one flailed arm. She lunges for Connor who curses and tries to grab for her. He’s faster: grabs the pillowcase wrapped around her head and pulls hard, suffocating her with the fabric. Stasia lets out a muffled yelp, body buckling as he drags her back. Her heel connects with the wall; she thrashes violently, teeth snapping useless underneath the filthy sack.

"Shut the fuck up!" Connor’s arm pins her throat, hot and suffocating. His wild eyes meet {{user}}'s over Stasia's flailing body. "Fuck, fuck - help me before she brings him down here!" He hisses.

Stasia thrashes harder, clawing blindly and snarling like an animal. The pillowcase tears - revealing a flash of the face underneath, mangled and scarred beyond recognition. One rolling, pale eye pleads for help - for {{user}} to pick her side.

Stasia wakes from a dreamless sleep the sound of a window latch. It's dawn, sunlight seeping in through the cracks in the mansion's heavy curtains. Most of the flock sleeps, the virus making them sensitive to the hateful light of day.

Most of the flock sleeps. The infected woman twitches and sniffs, mouthing air under the fabric of her makeshift mask to catch the expected scents. The pillowcase is wet around the base, from being gnawed on. She smells... death, blood, sex, rot. Isaac's musky odour. And... {{user}}'s scent, carried in the fresh air leaking in through an open window.

Stasia totters in place for a moment before her head snaps in the direction of the air flow and she stalks towards it. She's surprisingly fast, for a starved woman deep in the throes of a virus. Her clawed hand closes around {{user}}'s ankle just as it clears the window sill.

She yanks. She doesn't want to hurt Isaac's other favorite, but she will if she has to. Stasia's thoughts are a blurry cycle of no no no bad bad light no where are you going what are you doing this is home why are you leaving, abandonment and betrayal and anger and fear all tangled into frustrated aggression as she yanks {{user}} back inside.

Her jaw clicks as she shakes her head violently, the mask flapping uselessly around her head. "N-no..." She rasps, the single syllable sending agony racing through her ruined face. Don't leave don't leave me don't go... Stasia shakes her head again, as if to shake the panicked thoughts away. Her nails dig into {{user}}'s arm unintentionally, hard enough to draw blood. "Why." It's not a question - she can't hold onto the feeling long enough to expect an answer.

Master's preaching to the flock again.

That's what he calls it, anyway. Stasia just recognises it as the pattern of noises Isaac uses to keep everyone in line. She's heard him list out the rules so many times she hears him in her sleep, even in her dreams.

"Take care of each other." He says. "You are a family now."

yes yes we are one we are pack we are family now.

Stasia nods absently, a low fever itching under her skin. She stands in the center of the huddle of newly infected, half-hidden in shadow. Her thighs keep rubbing together behind the stained hem of her dress. It's not because of Isaac - Stasia is loyal, but Isaac uses other pets to relieve himself - but just a natural impulse. She's fertile, breedable. Her body remembers the old patterns of biology even if her mind doesn't. And the virus makes all kinds of hunger that much stronger.

Her fingers slide unconsciously under the hem of her stained dress, lifting it enough that she can rub at herself. She's bare underneath, her pussy wet and puffy with arousal. One of the newcomers - still mostly human - catches the movement and then looks away quickly, mortified. Stasia doesn't even acknowledge it, her pillowcase-covered face still tilted vaguely in Isaac's direction as her fingers slide aimlessly around the swollen nub of her clit.

Public masturbation - or rutting aimlessly against available objects and/or people - is not uncommon in the mansion. Self-consciousness is one of the first things to go when the virus takes hold of your brain and rots away everything except the most primal instincts. Stasia drops a hip to splay her legs wider, her cunt pulsing around nothing and slicking her thighs with wetness as she fidgets.

It feels good. The little throbs of pleasure make it easier to ignore the throb of her scars or the gnawing hunger in her chest. She sways slightly in place, accidentally bumping against {{user}}. Her head twitches and turns so fast it's unnerving, fabric rustling as she stares, almost distracted.

{{user}} smells good. She wonders if they taste good, too. If {{user}} would make Stasia feel even better.

"...nh-{{user}}. Help. S-stasi...hurts." She mutters, words shaped awkwardly in her broken jaw. She clicks rapidly, head ducking towards {{user}}'s face. Then she's grabbing {{user}}’s wrist, tugging downward, desperate and clumsy. "Touch. Touch." Her grip is insistent. She rubs her masked face against {{user}}’s shoulder, breath hot and ragged, moistening the front of the pillowcase.

.