Dream CXXX

I was with a group of people in a high-rise apartment building.  We were trapped on one of the upper floors because a plague of parasitic worms had swept the city, turning people either into zombies or crazed assassins.  We were among the last people to be uninfected, trying to stay isolated from the chaos outside.. 

Despite the risk of almost certain infection, people began disappearing from the building to go outside.  When they returned, they were acting strangely, so we led them all into a central room and locked them there.  We observed them on closed-circuit video, looking for signs of infection.  They began stabbing at each other, grabbing each other, rolling around together.  They weren't damaging each other, but it was clear they were infected.

We started taking extra precautions to keep people from leaving the floor.  One small elderly man came into the main room, smiling a broad, bright smile.  We stared at him, wondering if he had become infected.  We decided he had to be kept away from the rest of us, but we didn't want to put ihim in the main room because he was not violent or manic at all.  We tried to decide where to keep him but were unable to find an appropriate room that wasn't already being used. 

We started hearing radio reports that the infection was now contained, and that a cure was almost imminent.  Several people were reportedly being cured as we listened.  The radio gave instructions to go to the center of the city, where survivors would be inoculated.  Most people were tired of the isolation and voted to leave, but a few of us (including myself) believed that the parasites had taken over completely, and the voice on the radio was simply a ruse to get to the rest of the uninfected.

But we were outvoted.  As people left the floor, I saw someone put an orange rubber ring around the hinges of one room, to keep it from being opened from within.  I thought someone was locking in the little old man, but I turned and saw that it was he himself who was doing this.  He was closing himself inside.  His smile never wavered. 

He looked at me and nodded.  I nodded back.  Shortly afterward, I left the building, but instead of traveling to the city center, I turned and walked carefully in the opposite direction, and left the town instead.