Work Till Dusk
A biographical story of my life working in an office
Sam's cubical phone started to ring. But it wasn't Sam that answered.
"Hello, this is Sam's desk at Damn Generic Offices."
"Sam!" boomed the authoritative voice of Dean McMann, the boss. "Where are your damn reports? I needed them yesterday."
Henry replied in his calm office phone voice, "Actually this is Henry. Sam's been bitten and is one of the zombies blocking the garage parking gate."
"Damn Sam, even undead he's still causing delays."
It was all true, Sam along with half of the office now spent their time hanging out at the parking lot instead of the water cooler. They groaned and ate whatever came close to them. This zombie pandemic was really inconvenient. But just like every living person in the world, Henry had bills to pay and deadlines to meet.
"Okay Henry," said Dean McMann, "Sam's responsibilities are now yours. Get me the T-Report by dusk tonight."
Henry rolled his eyes but knew complaining would probably just remind the boss that his own report was now two days late. "Anything else?" asked Henry.
"Yes, your report is now two days late. Submit it with Sam's report. My office. Tonight. Dusk."
Henry put Sam's phone down and started to scribble all the info onto a sticky note but his blue pen was out of ink.
"Ugh, it's going to be one of those days eh," Henry said to himself. He gave up writing the note and went to Sam's computer to try logging in. Password protected.
Henry called up HR, "Hey this is Henry up on floor six. I need the password for a Sam Chew. He recently turned undead."
There was no reply on the phone.
"Hello?" questioned Henry. "Anyone there?"
Then a sudden scream on the receiver, "Help we're being overrun. We need help!" –click.
Henry put the phone down. HR was on the second floor. He really needed that password. Henry went to his cubical and grabbed a large pair of scissors.
The elevators were out so Henry walked towards the stairs. Em was there guarding the barricaded door as well as fixing the printer which had been broken all day. Usually Wang was the one that fixed the printer but the last productive thing he did was to get rid of Jimmy's annoying mouth. With Wang gone no one knew how to refill the printer cartridge. But that was Em's problem.
"Hey Em, I'm going to HR, need anything?"
"If you could grab some blue pens on the way over that'd be great."
"Like how many?"
"A dozen."
"Will do."
Em pulled back the barrier to the stairway door for Henry to pass. It was one of those plain concrete stairways that were only used when the elevators were down, which was today. Henry looked up. Blood was slowly dripping down the steps but other than that there was nothing out of place. Henry looked down, just grey walls and grey steps.
Henry was starting from the sixth floor and HR was on the second. Henry cautiously began his descent.
The stairway was a no man's land. A wild west. You would have no idea what to expect. A zombie, a co-worker, or a survivor from the city with a loaded shotgun ready to kill the dead or the living. Henry had taken the stairway every morning and evening since this outbreak started. And every time it was slightly different.
The fifth floor door was unremarkable and Henry almost tempted a visit to see if Alice was still around. But Henry had a lot of work to do and no spare time for a social call.
Fourth floor door was gone. Torn completely down and replaced with an endless barricade of chairs. It wasn't like this during the morning, thought Henry. He tried to peak through the chairs but couldn't see anything, just more chairs thrown on top of each other.
Third floor door was-
Suddenly Henry heard a noise coming from above. A groan or shriek. A zombie. Must be in the stairway. Several floors above. Henry picked up the pace. There was the second floor door. Perfectly clean and normal. Wait. No it wasn't like this during the morning. It had been covered in blood. A second groan from above. No time to overthink. Henry opened the door.
A zombie. A scream. Henry realized it wasn't him screaming. No it was the zombie that was screaming. Wait, it wasn't a zombie. It was Cam. Cam also realized that Henry wasn't a zombie and stopped screaming. Cam pulled Henry through the doorway and closed the door behind them.
"Jesus I thought you were the undead," said Cam and continued, "It doesn't help that you're covered in blood."
Henry looked himself over. His shirt was indeed covered in red. All his clothes in his closet were covered in blood and he had simply normalized it. Henry shrugged. "You alright? I called HR. There was screaming."
Cam chuckled, "Oh yeah we're fine. That's just Gary. He's new to HR and has been ignoring work by pretending to be overrun by zombies."
"And you're okay with them just doing no work?"
"I would help but I'm already overburdened. I manage security clearances and I'm the muscle for this floor."
"Yeah aren't we all overburdened," Henry concluded as he searched for HR.
Henry heard a scream coming from an office and found a kid hanging up a phone and then relaxing in their chair.
Henry tried to remember the name that Cam just gave him but he'd already forgotten. "You must be the screaming HR that hung up on me."
The HR kid looked unprepared for this confrontation, "Oh uh I think you got the wrong office."
Henry put on his intimidating voice, "I ain't got time for this. I just need someone's password, and then you can go back to doing nothing."
HR looked at the door behind Henry wondering if they could escape and avoid responsibility. They calculated the odds and concluded that escape was not an option. "Okay how can I help you?"
"I just said, I need the password for the computer of Sam Chew."
"I'm afraid I can't do that. You need proper authorization."
Henry started to look for something to throw at HR.
HR noticed and continued, "Even so, our database is completely offline and would be unable to do anything."
Henry's patience was at the end, "Cut the crap. I literally got passwords for four other people since this outbreak started. And it was easy. One simple phone call, instead of walking all the way down here. Give me the god damn password."
"Okay okay. The thing is that I uh, I don't know how to."
"What?"
"Listen I never wanted to be HR. I was just an intern for Jill when I started. I used to just get coffees for everyone. I don't know how to do any of this stuff."
At least the façade was over, thought Henry. "Move over, I can do it myself."
HR got out of their seat and Henry sat down at the computer. Henry's been working here long enough to know the gist of navigating through the company's system. It would only take a minute. HR was looming over Henry's shoulder.
"Say, HR. Could you get me a coffee. Black."
"Coming right up," said Coffee Intern cheerfully as they left the room.
Henry opened a file. A folder over there. Entered the generic password for the company. Searched Sam Chew. Opened file. Reset Password: password1. And that was it. Henry stood up and left the desk.
Coffee Intern arrived with the coffee just as Henry was leaving the office.
"Not bad timing," Henry said, "You're pretty good at fetching coffees."
"Thanks. I've practiced a lot."
Henry chugged the coffee and met up with Cam for his return back up to the sixth floor.
"Say Cam, you do you have any blue pens I could steal for my floor?"
"Sorry," replied Cam, "We're all out of blue pens here too. You'd want to try the eighth floor. That's where they keep office supplies."
"Thanks. I'll keep that in mind."
Henry slowly opened the door to the stairway. It looked all clear. Henry took two very slow steps through the doorway. Once past, Cam immediately closed the door.
One step at a time.
The stair barricade at floor four was gone. Now it opened to darkness and sounds of frantic moving. Henry avoided the doorway, and as quickly and quietly as possible, made his way upwards.
Squish
In all the rush Henry didn't notice before it was too late. Henry stepped on something mushy. Henry checked the underside of his black office shoe. Bloody guts. Quite literally the guts. Probably from a zombie earlier with an open stomach spilling its insides. Disgusting.
Henry tried to scrape the guts off his foot on a step. Henry looked up and realized he was standing at the fifth floor doorway. A simple door looking perfectly normal. He could go check up on Alice and see how she was doing. He would tell her about the screaming HR kid and she would laugh.
No stay focused. There is work to do.
Henry ignored the distractions and walked up to his floor, the sixth floor. Henry knocked and Em opened the door.
"Sup, how was HR?" asked Em.
"A real pain in the ass." replied Henry feeling too lazy to explain everything to Em. Instead he walked off to Sam's cubical.
Henry logged in with the password and looked through Sam's files. Thank God Sam kept his files organized. There it was. The T-Report. Henry transferred the file to his own computer.
At his own desk, Henry checked the T-report. He skim read what was there. It looked really boring but seemed complete. All that was needed was to print and hand to the boss. Sometimes things just work out.
Henry opened his own report. He didn't know what Sam's report was about, but he did have some idea of his own. His report was to examine someone else's proposal for replacing the city's speed limit signs to digital. At one point Henry probably knew what he was doing. But by now he just let his fingers go through the motions of his work. He was on autopilot with no control.
Before he knew it, Henry clicked the print button for both his and Sam's finished reports.
Henry looked to the window. It was almost dark out. How much time had passed? Henry checked his watch. It was close to dusk. Henry looked back out the window.
The city looked alive as the night approached. Lights and garbage fires illuminated the streets as people in cars honked their annoyance and/or fear of being eaten.
Henry got bored of the view and made his way to the printer.
"Please tell me the printer is working," Henry said as he approached Em.
"Lucky you, I've literally just calibrated it. Here let me help."
Em quickly clicked several buttons on the large printer. After navigating through numerous menu displays, the documents began to print.
"Voila" Em said. And then from behind, Dan, a colleague that worked on this floor, grabbed Em and took a large bite from her neck. Blood squirted everywhere. Em screamed and collapsed to the floor with Dan falling too, still biting onto the neck.
Joe and Catherin were there too. They were the lucky bastards that had offices instead of cubicles on this floor. They were slowly approaching, groaning with their arms reaching towards Henry. He grabbed the closest object available, the M110 Economy Heavy Duty 3-Hole Punch. Joe was dangerously close. Henry swung the hole puncher and smashed Joe's face. Chunks of his face splattered and more blood was spilt.
"That's for always hogging all the donuts every Friday," yelled Henry. He then turned his attention to Catherin. "Have fun bragging about your new fucking Tesla now." Henry said as he smashed Catherin's head with the bloodied hole puncher. The two bodies fell to the ground in a messy pile.
Henry looked at the late Em. Dan was still on top eating the flesh of Em's neck. Em's body was starting to twitch and was becoming undead. "You always were a creep Dan." Henry smashed Dan's head, and was on a roll so he smashed Em's head before they turned into a zombie.
Henry was on a high. The adrenaline was unreal. He had never felt so much energy while in this building. He grabbed the documents, which were only partially covered in blood, from the printer.
Henry looked around. The office was a mess. There were screams and groans. It seemed like floor six had been officially overrun. Henry wondered if he should stick around and help or just leave. He opted for the latter. He didn't really like anyone on his floor anyway. At the door to the stairway, Henry realized it was Em's fault that they got overrun. Em was supposed to be guarding the door, but was too distracted by the printer. They really should have had better multitasking skills.
Henry entered the stairway once again. He checked his watch and the day was indeed becoming late. "Up we go to the boss," Henry murmured to himself.
The stairway was not its usual clean boring grey. Now it had personality. The steps were flooded with a thick red liquid slowly pouring downwards and the walls had bright red paint strokes. Henry didn't care. He didn't even look at the walls or the steps or anything. All of his perception was occupied with the lookout for the undead. There it was, one directly ahead.
Swing.
The body fell past rolling and tumbling down the stairs. Henry continued.
Another zombie.
Similar results.
A scream from above.
Ahead was the door to floor seven. Zombies were pouring out of it. Some noticed Henry. He pushed against them. Their arms reached out trying to grab and scratch. Their mouths opened and slammed shut for a chance of flesh. They were strong and unrelenting.
If Henry hit the zombie's head hard enough with the metal hole punch, their heads would snap from their structured neck and dangle off. Some heads would smash like pumpkins. Sometimes the hit seemed to have no effect, but the body would slump away anyways.
Henry pushed past the seventh floor doorway. He continued to climb the steps. The zombies followed him up, just one step away from gabbing him into their horde. If there was any obstacle in front of Henry it would not be a good situation. The undead would not allow any misstep.
The eighth floor. There was the door. Closed. Henry felt relief. Finally an easy floor.
Henry spoke too soon.
A pack of undead appeared on the steps blocking the doorway. Henry was trapped with a horde in both directions. No escape. This was the end. Henry thought about his report, and also of Sam's report too. What would happen to them? The reports would be lost in time. Who would take up his work responsibilities now that he was going to be gone? All that work. Gone.
The door of the eighth floor opened. It was a person, armed with a staple gun with a bandolier of office supplies. They aimed the gun against a zombie and fired. The body fell. They aimed the gun at the next. Again. Again. And again. As Henry pummelled the zombies at his heals, the horde in front had disappeared.
The office staple gun slinger held the door open, "C'mon quickly! Inside."
Henry jumped through the doorway and the gunslinger closed it quickly and pushed a vending machine into place, muffling the banging of the horde.
The gunslinger looked at Henry, "That was hella close. Welcome to the Supplies Floor."
Henry looked around. What used to be a standard cubical arrangement, had been converted to some sort of military base. Tables with equipment and weapons were on display. Workers wore makeshift duct tape body armor and some had their ties around their heads as bandanas.
Henry was impressed, "Wow, you're all prepared."
Gunslinger smirked, "What floor are you from."
"Sixth floor."
"Our operators told us that floor was overrun."
"Yeah I just barely managed to escape."
"So what brings you up here?"
"I have a report to give to the boss." Henry held up his report.
"In person? You couldn't have just emailed him your report. It's almost impossible to get to the tenth floor right now. Floor nine has been completely compromised."
"I gotta give it to him by…" Henry checked his watch, "…in only fifteen minutes."
The gunslinger scratched their head. "Well Smith was planning on a raid that might get you up there." They took their walkie-talkie out and spoke. "Smith are you there? Over."
Static spoke through the device, "Copy. Yes this is Smith. Over"
"What's the status on the infiltration? Over"
"We're ready. We just need one more person. Over."
"Copy. We're on our way. Over."
They were at a door in the lobby. A group of hardcore looking office workers were waiting.
"The plan is simple," said Smith, a full time jogger who had replaced his office pants with running shorts. "This floor is connected to the ninth floor through this atrium stairway. It's completely infested with the undead, but we'll have lots of room to manoeuvre. The trick is to stay in tight circle formation while we move as a team. Remember the objective. The food."
Henry couldn't help but interrupt, "What?"
Smith glared and singled out Henry, "You have a concern of the plan?"
"Yeah, why are you going up there?"
Smith explained, "Floor nine is notorious for their famous potlucks. They were supposed to have one today to celebrate Frank's retirement. Usually us lower floors aren't invited, but with the zombie pandemic, today is the perfect opportunity to get a slice of the pie."
"You're risking your life for pie?"
Someone else in the group spoke up, "They have a lot more than pie. I'm looking forward to Jennifer's braised beef."
"You're insane, don't you have more important things to worry about?"
Smith spoke up, "Nah, all our bosses turned on the first day. We haven't had any work to do since the pandemic started. Why are you here, if not for the food?"
"I have to get to the tenth floor."
"Ah yes, we all dream of working on the top floor. Well there is a fire escape stairway next to the lounge that you can take. Any other questions?"
"Actually yeah," Henry said. "Do you have any spare blue pens?"
Henry's pocket housed a fresh blue pen as the double doors opened. They moved smoothly through the crowd of zombies, penetrating the horde like water in oil. The group pushed the horde back as they travelled in a tight circle deeper into the crowd. In all the chaos of blood and gore, there was a calmness. Henry's mind went blank as his body moved through the motions. He didn't need to think. He didn't need to calculate where his arm should be or how far to step. No, some other part of his brain took control that required no consent from him. Henry was just along for the ride as his body acted perfectly.
So instead Henry thought about what he would eat for dinner that night. It was Friday takeout night. Thai food was always good but Henry was getting a little bored of it. Maybe he'd try the new sushi place.
Someone screamed. Henry didn't know their name but it was the person to his direct right. A zombie had bitten their arm and was pulling the poor soul away from the circle. Oh well. The survivors kept the formation tight as they continued their tactical shuffle towards the potluck room.
Henry wondered what phone he should buy. His current one had a cracked screen, was becoming unbearably slow, and the battery life was rather shit. Apple released a new phone recently that was very slick but the thousand dollar price tag was implausibly high.
Blood splattered into Henry's eye and he lost concentration. He wiped the blood off and continued to hack away with the group.
The man on the newsfeed said that ingesting zombie blood had no zombie related negative effects. Though other newsfeeds said the opposite. Runner's Weekly also said that the zombie pandemic was the perfect opportunity to start running this summer. But Henry still couldn't find the motivation, especially being so tired after work.
"There it is!" Smith yelled as the group stepped over the corpses of various types of bodies. "Almost there."
Henry continued to question why anyone would start running this summer. This year was the hottest recorded summer in decades. It was downright suicidal to run in this weather.
The group kicked through the doors. The room was relatively empty with only three zombies. They quickly closed the doors and wedged a chair under the handles to keep them shut. They took out the remaining zombies and were left in peace.
"We did it," panted one of the survivors.
They sure did. The room had four tables packed with a variety of foods. The survivors got in line and grabbed paper plates and started filling them with a little bit from each dish.
Henry did not participate. He looked at his watch, wiped off the blood, and then read the time. Only two minutes until dusk.
"I gotta get to the tenth floor," Henry said.
"Ha, no time to enjoy the victories eh?" said Smith as he ate a wing. "Very well, that door will be your way up." Smith pointed to a small door with an exit sign above it with additional words saying: Only use in Emergencies.
Henry didn't bother saying goodbye or even waving. He exited through the door.
This stairway was narrow and appeared unaffected from the current situation. It was quiet. Henry's footsteps echoed as he walked up, tainting the clean steps with his bloody footprints.
There it was. The door to the tenth floor. The top floor. The final floor.
Henry opened the door.
A startled person on the other side yelled, "What the hell. Jesus you scared me. I didn't even know this door could open. Wow you look like shit."
Henry brushed the observation aside, "What way to the boss's office?"
They pointed down the hall.
Henry walked.
Everyone on the floor looked so normal and passé. Their outfits were clean and well fitted. Shirts were tucked in with collars and sleeves buttoned. They walked slowly and stood near watercoolers. They all stopped what they were doing and watched as Henry walked by, towards the office of the boss.
The door was large and wooden. A secretary sat next to it looking at their phone.
Henry introduced his presence by saying, "I'm here to give this to the boss." He held out the two files.
The secretary looked up, "You can put the files here." They pointed to a bin with several other files.
Henry dropped the work into the bin. Looked at the door to the boss's office, then looked at the secretary.
The secretary without even looking up from their phone said, "You can go now."
Henry walked away, back to the fire escape. He walked down to the ninth floor and entered the potluck room.
The food was still on the table but the group Henry entered with were now walking aimlessly undead. There was Smith, on his knees eating the fresh corpse of one of the others. Henry figured that Smith would be the type that would get bitten and not notice. Henry walked past the room without alerting the feasting zombies.
Henry travelled back to the eighth supply floor, retracing his steps and defeating any zombies in the way.
"It's a shame what happened to Smith," said Gunslinger.
Henry entered the usual stairway and went down to his floor, the sixth floor. This time the stairway was quiet and uneventful. A few zombies hung around on his floor. Was no issue. Henry returned to his cubical to gather his coat and bag. Work was over for the day.
He returned to the stairway one last time and descended to the ground floor.
He bumped into Cam at the second floor. They were also leaving so they walked together to the lobby.
"Another day, another dollar," said Cam.
"Yeah I guess so," replied Henry.
Cam continued, "Though I did read online today that the dollar is going to go down because of this zombie situation. All the more reason to keep working to get as much money as possible."
Henry thought that seemed a little counterintuitive. What was the point of working if their money was soon going to be worthless? He didn't say his question out loud however.
They exited the building and went separate ways. "See you tomorrow," Cam said.
It was night out now. Henry walked to his usual bus stop on the side of the road. There were two others there who probably worked at the same building but Henry didn't recognize them.
A military Humvee drove by as they waited for the bus. A voice on the microphone of the Humvee boomed out saying, "Stay indoors. Avoid contact with the undead."
As the Humvee drove on, three zombies appeared slowly following the noise of the vehicle. They were approaching the bus stop. Henry checked the bus schedule and saw it was still going to take twenty minutes for the bus to arrive. The three of them waiting for the bus each wordlessly eliminated a zombie.
After the justified killing, one of them sat back down on the bench and continued to read their book. Henry and the other one stood next to each other.
The stranger spoke, "Y'know I'm okay with the all the undead. It's quite exciting don't you agree?"
Henry didn't know what the stranger was talking about. "I suppose so," Henry cautiously said.
The stranger continued, "Usually I'd be exhausted after work. But I feel so alive all the time now. I feel like I have purpose now. I think I'll go the gym tonight. And cook a steak for dinner. And talk to everybody I see. I feel like taking advantage of every situation. To not waste a minute."
Henry looked at his watch and wondered where the fuck the bus was.
As if the gods were listening, the bus appeared. It was packed full. They squeezed in.
It was a diverse group. It was filled with office workers in their suits, poor looking families eating their fast food dinner, young kids trying to look tough, an elderly person looking confused as to what stop to get off, and the corner sitters taking their bus naps.
Outside the police disco lights put on a show for the night. Some people were running, others were shambling.
Henry overheard a woman talking the phone. "No don't worry about me here. The news is over exaggerating it. My district is only a yellow zone…"
Henry got up from his seat as the bus approached his stop, his gaze resting on the person sleeping in the corner of the bus. They twitched in their sleep. Blood was dripping from their sleeve. They twitched again, almost violently like. They weren't sleeping. They were already dead. They were turning.
No one seemed to notice. Not even the person next to them. Henry quickly looked out the window. His stop was almost there. He looked back at the sleeper. More twitching. The mouth was instinctively opening and closing.
The bus stopped. The automatic speaker said, "Crow Street." The door opened. Henry immediately jumped out. He was the only one to exit. The bus pulled out and kept going. Henry didn't look back.
It was only a few minute walk to his apartment building. Henry took a shortcut through a dark alleyway. He avoided focusing on a torn trash bag to avoid seeing the maggots creeping around. The rest of the alleyway was uneventful and Henry reached the door to his building.
He punched the code into the door, it unlocked and he entered.
Henry clicked the button for the elevator. The doors opened and he entered. The elevator slowly closed but then a hand interrupted the doors. A woman quickly entered. She was covered in blood and holding a hammer that still had brains on it. It was Henry's neighbour that he saw frequently, but embarrassingly had forgotten her name a long time ago.
The elevator started to rise.
"Rough day eh?" asked the woman.
"You could say that again," answered Henry.
"Have you heard that Louis passed away yesterday?"
Old Louis was the apartment between Henry and the woman. Old Louis was nice.
"I hope we don't get a loud asshole moving in," said Henry.
"That would be unfortunate," she said.
The elevator reached their floor. The doors opened.
"See you around," the woman said as she walked ahead to her place.
"Oh wait," said Henry
The woman turned one last time to look at Henry. "Do you want a blue pen?" Henry held out a pen.
"Sure, why not." The woman took it. "Thanks."
The woman began to walk away to her apartment then stopped and said, "Hey, do you want to come over for dinner? I got a fresh pack of ribs."
"Sure, why not," said Henry.
The meat was tender and delicious with every bite. Strings of meat peeled easily off the bones. Juicy red liquid poured out with each bite. The taste was addictive. Each bite was not enough. More. More. More.
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