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been trying to find a cure, or at least a use, for zombies." He watched for a reaction, and was caught somewhat off guard by the lack of any real change in the dark woman's expression. "I'm not talking voodoo or brainwashing someone into thinking they're dead and revived. I'm talking of a virus that infects, destroys the thinking and frontal lobes of the victim's brain, essentially lobotomizing them and give them a hunger for flesh of any sort, but preferably human. Oh sure there have been natural outbreaks here and there for the past few hundred, if not thousand, years. However this thing has been a relatively quiet disease, not getting the sort of exposure or range that most other pathogens that make it out of their natural territory seem to."  
    Elizabeth perked while that explanation had been given. "Ethics of infecting even willing volunteers aside, wouldn't any lab created strain simply compete rather than supersede the natural variant?" She saw that she had scored a hit so went somewhat further. "I had a friend that did a paper on zombies so I kinda had to put up with a semester's worth of him going on about the material." Again that predatory smile, "Granted there's a world of difference between a term paper and being out in the sticks isn't there?"  
    "Hm, this friend of yours wouldn't be a tree trunk of a man, someone you'd think would have a brain the size of a walnut, but could run you 'round in knots trying to keep up?" Elizabeth nodded emphatically at this. She knew the man quite well, and loathed how easy everything seemed to him. "I see you're yet another member of those that feel slighted at how the man seems to do eight things at once and expect the rest of the world to meet his standards. Don't worry, you're far from alone in that sentiment."  
    A buzz from the only door to the room was their only warning before a well dressed man-like thing shambled in the room. I say manlike because while it had the general appearance of humanity there were subtle things about it's expression, or rather lack thereof, the vacancy in it's eyes, and paleness of skin that made it seem more an animated corpse than something alive. Doctor Shelby took the tray it held and waved it off. "Thank you that will be all." He offered his guest a pint glass of a dark liquid with roughly a quarter inch of frothy head at the top of the glass. "You'll like this stuff. I trade regularly with the guy that brews it and," He sighed before setting the glass beside Elizabeth's wallet and other personal things ."Right. Sorry. Forgot to warn you that my servants were undead I'd managed to re-purpose into something a little more useful. They're crap for anything that needs any sort of flexibility or speed, but they're good for carrying things from place to place, don't whine about pay, and if the controls I have wired in ever go on 'em there's a charge just inside the skull that vaporizes the brain without sending messy infected bits everywhere." He waved a hand in front of his guest. "Elizabeth. C'mon it's alright. They won't hurt you. Promise."  
    "That's just plain creepy man." There was no anger in Elizabeth's voice, nor was there accusation. "Since you've come clean, and you smell worried about something I might as well tell you." She grabbed the glass and took a sip, then a long drink before setting it back. "Good stuff, I'll have to see if I can't get some of it imported when I go home. Anyway George you don't have to worry if I'm going to turn into a werewolf or something like that because of that thing that mauled me because I already am one." George quirked his head to one side, then the other, but didn't interrupt. "Had I been paying attention to my nose I would have known he was there long before I got to where he was waiting, but I've always been a city girl so just took the smell as something that was supposed to be here. I mean I'd had a whole load of scents stuck in my nose I'm not familiar with since I landed."  
    "That would