According to therapist Anwar Waller, one of his newest clients was completely unaware he had turned and joined the ranks of the undead.
“He was completely distraught,” Dr. Waller shares. “M. (name obscured for patient privacy) couldn’t understand why his family had boarded up their family residence and installed barbed wire and angled spikes.”
According to M., he returned home from a night hunt—a group raid intended to decrease the numbers of infected near settlements—to find his family horrified at his return and scurrying to get indoors while locking him out.
Dr. Waller continues, “M. told me he remembers the group getting surprised by a pack of undead that blindsided them from a nearby building. He claimed they beat back the horde, but remembers being incredibly tired and just needing to ‘catch his breath.'”
Once morning came, M. recalls waking up, pulling himself to his feet and heading home. He noted having blurred vision and was curious as to why his family members smelled like breakfast to him. He wondered if they had cooked and eaten just before he arrived and he was feeling incredibly hungry for raw meat. It was then that Dr. Waller felt it was crucial to inform M. that he had, in fact, been turned during the ambush the night before. He was now a member of the undead masses he had been hunting and the itching he was feeling was his own skin beginning to rot.
“He just sat there,” Added Dr. Waller. “Dejected. Distraught. And at this point, his speech capabilities had quickly deteriorated. Where I would expect the average person to begin crying or voicing complaints about this not being possible, I simply observed the saddest and most pained grunt as if to say, “why me?”
It was then that M. turned and lunged at Dr. Waller as if lashing out at the person that gave them the bad news. Fortunately, clinic staff had quietly chained M’s arms and legs during the session, rendering him unable to feed on his therapist in anger.
We asked Dr. Waller about providing services to the undead and we were told that the undead are also in need of mental health support and that his clinic was there to meet the needs of the community.
“We will not abandon them as the rest of society has,” cautioned Dr. Waller. “We can only make for a better life in the wastes if we show that we are compassionate and willing to help those in need.”
Unfortunately, we were unable to learn how the Dr’s expenses were covered or what support the clinic received. However, staff was extremely excited to show us the pile of severed, uneaten limbs patients had deposited outside the clinic, apparently as tribute or payment.
“Their souls may not be here anymore, ” added Dr. Waller. “But, we are.”
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[DISCLAIMER: This article is a work of fiction and satire. Any resemblance to real events or persons is purely coincidental.]
