Chapter Eleven
It was less than a mile to the access ramps that led to the Tobin Bridge, and from there another twelve miles to her home in Nahant. Alissa figured that, with luck, she would be home by sunset.
As Alissa rounded the corner, a line of cars stretching a block and a half from Cambridge Street obstructed her path. She stopped fifty feet from the last car in line and stood on the runner to get a better view. Traffic heading from Storrow Drive clogged Cambridge Street, preventing the cars in front of her from merging. Incredibly, a garbage truck made a three-point turn on the crowded street, banging into other vehicles and crushing two people beneath its wheels. She tried to figure a way around this mess when the realization dawned on her that the people around the truck were deaders. Dozens of them fed on the living in the vehicles near the front of the line. She had no idea if they came from the hospital or Storrow Drive. Not that it mattered. She had to get out now.
Sliding back into the Ram, Alissa shifted the pick-up into REVERSE, backed up twenty feet, and swung left onto Cardinal William O’Connell Way. In the process, she cut off a speeding Boston Police cruiser with sirens blaring and lights flashing. She half expected the officer to come after her. Instead, he blared his horn and swerved around the pick-up, colliding head on with the garbage truck that had turned around and raced back down Blossom Street. The garbage truck crushed the front end of the police cruiser and shoved the wreck out of the way.
Alissa gunned the engine and headed down Cardinal William O’Connell Way, winding her way in front of Shriner’s Hospital for Children and St. Joseph’s church, then turning the bend leading toward Staniford Street.
“Fuck!”
Gridlock blocked both lanes of Staniford Street, making it impossible for the five cars stopped in front of her to move. Alissa contemplated her next move.
A Ford minivan with a family of four two vehicles in front pulled out into the next lane to make a U-turn. Alissa jumped and screamed as an air horn blared to her left. The garbage truck had followed her and now rushed by, shaving off the Ram’s sideview mirror, and T-boned the Ford, shearing it in half. The two children flew out of the rear, their seat belts torn apart by the crash, and tumbled through the air. One bounced off a nearby UPS van, leaving a blood streak against the brown paint. The other was thrown twenty feet down the road, the still moving body being crushed underneath the wheels of the garbage truck. Five deaders clung to the side of the truck, clawing at the sanitation worker holding on to the side. The crash through them off. The sanitation worker landed head-first, its head exploding on impact. Scrambling to their feet, the deaders pounced on the body, ripping off chunks of flesh and devouring them while still warm. The truck’s driver ignored the devastation, increasing speed and using his vehicle as a battering ram to clear a path on Staniford Street. He clipped the front and rear fenders of two cars in the right lane, spinning around the larger car and flipping onto its side the smaller of the two. Continuing through, he drove the front of the truck into the driver’s side of a phone company van, propelling it across the sidewalk and into the façade of the building opposite where it shattered the plate-glass window. Pedestrians screamed and ran from the inevitable. The driver attempted to swerve onto Staniford Street but traveled much too fast. His truck lifted onto its right-side tires, hovered for a moment, and overturned. Its weight and speed propelled it a hundred feet along Staniford Street, ripping down a streetlamp, crushing a dozen people, and shoving four cars out of the way.
Alissa noticed none of these details. When she glanced into the side mirror and saw the garbage truck approaching, she also noticed a pack of deaders chasing it. Pulling into the opposite lane, she fell in behind the truck, keeping one hundred feet to its rear and following through the carnage. When it flipped over onto Staniford Street, she swerved to the left, taking advantage of the path it cut to maneuver around the traffic, and cut back onto the sidewalk once the larger vehicle had finally come to rest. She slowed enough to give pedestrians a chance to get out of the way.
Traffic packed Nashua Street, which led to the ramps to the Tobin Bridge. Trying to escape this way would trap her in a kill zone. With luck, she could reach the bridge from the harbor.
She continued along the sidewalk, cutting through the corner parking plot in front of West End, and bounced over the curb onto Merrimack Street. Something huge was going down a quarter of a mile away near Haymarket. The lights from a dozen police cars, firetrucks, and ambulances strobed repeatedly. No way would she get caught in that. Swinging left onto Portland Street, she rushed through the neighborhood toward Causeway Street.
Here she came upon a total clusterfuck. Traffic backed up to the Boston Gardens. Even the oncoming lanes were packed with vehicles trying to escape the outbreak. A few other cars tried using the sidewalk on her side of the street to sneak past the traffic. Two had rear ended each other a few hundred feet down, making it impossible to pass. The sidewalk on the opposite side remained open, but it was impossible to get through the lines of vehicles. She contemplated backing up and trying another road to get onto Causeway Street, but the traffic jam stretched as far as she could see. Alissa contemplated her next move. Getting out of this part of Boston by vehicle would be impossible. She thought about going into the Garden and picking up the subway from there but quickly ruled that out, knowing her chances of survival underground were slim when the outbreak reached there. That left only one option.
Grabbing the backpack and slinging it over her shoulder, Alissa abandoned the Ram and began walking.
As she approached North Washington Street, she realized what caused the gridlock. Traffic filled the street from downtown Boston all the way across the North Washington Street Bridge, blocking the vehicles trying to exit Causeway Street. Alissa felt good about her decision. She would not be able to escape the city by car. She would have to walk across the Tobin Bridge and hopefully hitch a ride once on the other side.
Screaming from behind sent a chill down her spine. Spinning around, she saw a crowd racing around the cars, deaders close behind and tackling the slower runners. The deaders outnumbered the living, and every time a human went down the rest of the pack rushed around the attack and sought out new victims. She had only minutes to make her escape. Alissa broke into a run, making her way to the sidewalk and moving as fast as possible.
When she reached the intersection of Causeway and North Washington, the situation had deteriorated rapidly. Hundreds of people left their cars behind and made their way to the bridge. The deaders behind her had approached to within a hundred feet, and another horde made its way down North Washington from the Haymarket area. In ten seconds, this area would become a slaughterhouse in less than a minute. She searched for a safe place to hide.
A pizza parlor sat across the street, a green neon sign in the window announcing they were open. Alissa dashed between the abandoned vehicles and pushed her way through the panicking crowd. Reaching the sidewalk, she headed for the shop. A small pack of deaders noticed her and gave chase. Alissa increased speed. Her muscles ached from the exertion and she breathed in deep, heavy gasps. After what seemed like an eternity, she reached it and entered. Spinning around, she slammed the door shut and engaged the dead bolt, and then backed away.
Alissa felt safe until she heard a bullet being chambered into a weapon.
“Get out now or I’ll shoot.”
Chapter Twelve
Alissa raised her hands above her head and slowly turned around. An older man with greying hair stood in the center of the parlor. She focused on the pump-action shotgun aimed at her. His hands shook and, with his finger on the trigger, Alissa worried he might accidentally shoot her. On the opposite side of the counter stood a young kid in his late teens or early twenties, dressed in a white apron, with his arm around a teenage girl who had the same facial features as the man brandishing the shotgun.
“I don’t want any trouble,” Alissa said.
“Then get out.” The old man used the barrel of
the shotgun to motion toward the exit. “Now.”
“Papa, please.” The teenage girl tried to stop her dad but the boy in the apron held her back. “She’s not one of them.”
“You don’t know that.” The old man shifted his gaze over his shoulder. “I’m trying to protect you.”
“I promise I’m no—”
The old man shifted his attention back to Alissa. He readjusted his aim, his hands shaking worse than before.
“At least take your finger off the trigger before you kill me,” Alissa pleaded.
“If you’re worried about being shot then get out.”
A tense moment passed before a deader in a blood-soaked policeman’s uniform slammed onto the glass. Everybody inside the restaurant jumped. The old man shifted his aim toward the deader but did not pull the trigger.
“Wh-what the fuck is that?” he stammered.
“That’s what you want to send me back out into. They’re all over the streets.”
“Papa, you can’t do it. Let her stay.”
Three more deaders joined the first. They covered the glass in streaks of blood as they clasped for the food inside. A young deader in a Boston sweatshirt gnawed on the pane.
The old man stepped toward the door, driving the deaders into a frenzy. “This can’t be happening.”
“It is, Mr. Giovani.” The boy behind the counter hugged the teenage girl.
A deader in a firefighter’s uniform banged its fist against the glass and snarled at the old man. He raised the shotgun. “I’ll be fucked before I let you get me.”
“Mr. Giovani, don’t—”
Moving to the right, Alissa raced around the old man and headed for the counter as he fired a round into the face of the firefighter deader. The blast shattered the glass and propelled it back onto the sidewalk. With nothing to stop them, the other three ran into the restaurant. The old man fired, hitting one in the left shoulder and doing nothing more than blasting of its arm. Before he could reload, the other two tackled the old man to the floor and began to feed. The one-armed deader took a moment to regain its footing, staring at where its arm used to be.
When the deaders burst through, the kid had pulled the teenage girl along with him and toward the swinging doors leading into the kitchen. She resisted, crying for her father. As Alissa came around the corner of the counter, she slapped the girl across the face, placed her hands on the teenager’s back, and shoved her into the kitchen. The blow snapped the teenager back out of her shock. She stared at her father one last time before heading for safety. Alissa paused, checking on the situation. The one-armed deader noticed her and rushed forward. Alissa burst into the kitchen.
“If there’s another way out, head for it.”
“This way.” The kid took the teenage girl by her hand and headed for the rear of the kitchen.
Alissa chased after them for five feet, stopped, and spun around to face the entrance into the kitchen, her Glock raised. When the one-armed deader burst through, she fired a single round into its forehead. The bullet compacted, blowing off the top of its skull and popping the eyes from their sockets. Yet the deader did not collapse. It fell back against the sink, got its bearings, and staggered forward, its outstretched arms attempting to find the prey its eyes could not. From the other room, she heard the other two deaders snarl and head for the kitchen. Alissa turned and ran.
The teenager stood by a door leading out into a back alley. Upon seeing Alissa, she motioned to catch her attention.
“This way. Hurry.”
Alissa raced through, the teenager right behind her. As Alissa raised the Glock and scanned her surroundings for danger, the kid slammed shut the metal door and pushed his weight against it. The teenager closed the hasp over the metal loop, slipped a padlock through it, and secured it as the deaders slammed into the other side. Both the kid and the teenager jumped back. Alissa instinctively raised the Glock, ready to fire. The lock held.
“Thanks.” Alissa gasped, trying to catch her breath.
“You’re welcome,” the kid replied. “I’m John. This is Maria.”
“Alissa.”
“Do you know what the hell is going on?” Maria asked.
“There’s some type of virus running through the city that turns people violent. And it’s spreading quickly. We have to get out of here ASAP if we’re going to survive.” Alissa pointed north. “Where does this alley go?”
“That takes you out onto Commercial Street, right near the intersection with North Washington.”
“That’s where these things are massed.”
“Where are you going?” John asked.
“I’m trying to get the Tobin Bridge. I live in Nahant and want to get home.”
John shook his head. “Your only way to get to the bridge from here is across the North Washington Street Bridge.”
“Fuck!”
Maria pointed down the alley. “We don’t have to go that way. We could cut through the parking garage and approach the bridge from the river.”
“That would work,” John agreed.
“Do you know the way?” asked Alissa.
“Yes.”
“Go. I’ll provide cover.”
Maria headed down the alley for several hundred feet, turned left, and cut between two apartment buildings. They emerged onto Prince Street across from the DeFelippo Playground. After checking to make certain no deaders were in sight, the trio crossed the street into the playground and made their way through the adjacent dog park, emerging onto Hull Street.
“Where now?” Alissa asked.
Maria pointed to the left and started in that direction. Alissa stopped her and lifted the Glock. “I’ll lead. John, watch our rear.”
They made their way along the eastern façade of the North End Garage, Alissa keeping the weapon aimed ahead of her. She heard screaming and snarling coming from the North Washington-Causeway Streets intersection two blocks away, but no humans or deaders were visible. At the end of the garage, Alissa waved for John and Maria to stop. Moving cautiously to the corner, she peered around it.
The intersection had become a charnel house. Blood smeared the gridlocked vehicles and flowed across the pavement, pouring toward the gutters and swirling into the sewers. A pack of deaders roamed amongst the vehicles, feeding off the bodies spread across the ground. A few people had tried to escape in this direction but had not made it far. Most had been devoured to the point that, when their bodies reanimated, they could not chase their prey but crawled along the pavement. Those victims not killed in the onslaught had escaped across the North Washington Street Bridge, leading the deaders away. That was the good news.
The bad news was they needed to cross that bridge to escape the city.
Leaning back against the wall, Alissa faced the others. “There are deaders out there.”
“How many?” asked Maria. John motioned for her to be quiet.
“It’s hard to tell. They’re mixed among the vehicles and are feeding off their victims, which means they’re distracted. It looks like the rest of the deaders have already crossed the bridge. We should be able to make it out if we’re keep quiet and stay on our guard.”
“Wait.” Maria squeezed John’s hand. “What about Mimi?”
“Who’s Mimi?”
“Her grandmother,” John answered.
“She lives with me and Papa. She’s eighty-three. She won’t be able to survive on her own.”
Alissa did not like where this conversation was heading. “Where do you live?”
“Here in the North End.”
“We can’t bring her with us,” said John. He focused his attention on Alissa. “Her grandmother can only walk with a cane.”
Alissa frowned. “We can’t take Mimi. She’s too much of a liability.”
“We can’t leave her.” Maria’s voice cracked, on the verge of tears.
“It’s only temporary. Once the authorities have restored order you can come back for her.”
“No.” Maria sh
ook her head several times. “She’ll be scared and alone. I won’t do that to her.” Maria placed her hand on John’s chin and turned it to her, her eyes pleading. “Come with me. Her house is only a few blocks from here. We can wait this out from there.”
Alissa could tell by the pained expression on John’s face that he did not want to go back into the city. For a minute, he said nothing. Maria gazed into his eyes and whispered the word, “Please?”
John wrapped an arm around Maria, pulling her close. “I’m going to stay with Maria. Can you get out of the city on your own?”
Alissa nodded. “Good luck.”
“You, too.” Taking Maria by the hand, John led her back down the street toward the North End.
Alissa watched them for a few seconds before turning her attention back to the matter at hand. She peered around the corner of the parking garage and, once certain no danger presented itself, rushed across the street to the school. A knocking startled her. She dropped into a crouch, her eyes trained along the Glock’s site as she swung the weapon from one side to the other, searching for the threat. The knocking sounded again to her rear. It came from the first-floor windows of the school where a young woman surrounded by elementary-aged children tapped on the glass to catch her attention. The woman opened the window and yelled to Alissa.
“Can you help us?”
Alissa raised a forefinger to her lips as she approached the window. The woman ignored her.
“What’s the situation like?”
“Shut up,” Alissa whispered forcefully. “You them want to hear you?”
“Who?” This time the woman spoke softly. “What’s going on?”
“There’s some type of virus spreading through the city. It’s highly contagious and anyone who contacts it becomes violent in seconds. Hundreds of people have been killed in the past hour.”
“Dear God.”
“How many of you are there?”
“A little over a hundred and thirty students, all of them elementary schoolers, and fifteen or so teachers and office staff.”
Nurse Alissa (Book 1): Nurse Alissa vs. the Zombies Page 6