Fortunately, the zombie-mobile did its duty, shoving the ravenous diners out of our path while maintaining traction on the carnage-covered ground. I had no time — or desire — to examine the grill, tires, or undercarriage of my baby, but I assumed there was now plenty of real gore to match the comic-con paint job.
Once I’d mowed across the zombies and their unfortunate victims, and my front tires finally hit the asphalt of the westbound lanes, jolting the van and its occupants, I again turned the steering wheel to the left and headed in the right direction: what native New Orleanians would’ve called the lakeside of Rampart Street. As I passed the headquarters of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Foundation, I heard a plaintive meow beside me.
Glancing to my right, toward Azazel’s carrier, I spotted her wide, green eyes staring at me through the slits. “Sorry, sugarplum. That was pretty bumpy, I know.”
She meowed again, sadder that time.
I shifted my eyes back to the street ahead, but continued trying to soothe my little girl. “You’re probably hungry. Thirsty, too. And sick of that stupid carrier. But I can’t let you out just yet. For your own safety.” I peeked at her again. “As soon as we’re able to take a break, I promise, I’ll let you roam around a bit.”
She meowed once more — whether to underscore her displeasure or agree to my terms, I couldn’t be sure — then she lowered her furry head and presumably went back to sleep.
Just as I returned my gaze to the road, I noticed several people darting across Rampart, probably headed to Louis Armstrong Park — a well-tended thirty-two-acre oasis in the infamous Tremé neighborhood that bordered the French Quarter. They likely hoped the tall, iron fence surrounding the park — once a popular place for outdoor concerts and festivals — would keep them safe from the undead. I almost tagged them as I crossed St. Ann.
Gazing in my side-view mirror, I watched as the fleeing people made it mere steps from the stately front gates of the park, when a mass of zombies surged from the Quarter — surely their reason for running in the first place. Before any of the potential victims could even start to climb the gates, the undead had tackled the lot of them and, as usual, commenced ripping them into pieces.
After taking a shortcut down St. Peter and Basin Streets, I edged closer to the I-10 entrance ramp Clare and I normally used when headed to her mom’s house. It felt strange driving on traffic-free roads with nonoperational stoplights, so close to the NOPD station, St. Louis Cemetery No. 1, and other neighborhood landmarks usually bustling with people — now either overrun by zombies or hauntingly vacant.
Someone must have still been alive inside the police station because I heard several gunshots from within. Along the outside of the building, enormous piles of destroyed bodies were piled up against the entrance and near a few of the windows. The cops — or whoever was inside — certainly put up a valiant fight, but the hordes of zombies kept coming. Sooner or later, the survivors would run out of ammunition — and then they’d either starve to death, barricaded inside, or be eaten as they tried to escape.
I shrugged and kept driving.
By the time I reached the interstate entrance, I’d figured out my greatest obstacle to leaving the city. As much as hate admitting it, Troy had been right about the highway: it was jam-packed with stalled vehicles.
Despite the suddenness of the zombie invasion, plenty of people had apparently had enough time to evacuate. Or at least attempt to evacuate. Hard to believe so many New Orleanians had managed to reach their automobiles and hit the highway — given all the mayhem of the night before — but a strong sense of self-preservation could provide a necessary dose of adrenaline and focus.
Presently, most of the cars and trucks appeared to be abandoned, with zombies weaving between both the vehicles and the bodies of those who’d unfortunately made a run for it — and ultimately lost the race. Immediately, I tried to bulldoze a path between the crowded lines of automobiles. With my responsive driving skills, I managed to miss most of the meandering zombies, but when a bleached-blonde woman with half of her face missing moved in front of my van too quickly, I inadvertently caught her with the front left edge of my bumper.
Although numerous obstacles made it impossible to drive fast, it was such a tight squeeze between vehicles that I simply couldn’t avoid her. The van knocked her to her knees, and my bumper crushed the remainder of her face against a brand-new Lexus. Her head squished like a grape, but luckily, most of the blood and zombie goo seemed to splash onto the once-pristine hood of the luxury car. Not that I was actually concerned about how the exterior of my zombie-mobile looked.
Hampered by numerous obstacles as well as the smoky atmosphere of a city on fire, it took me almost twenty minutes just to drive a couple hundred yards. Beyond dead bodies and abandoned cars, I actually spotted several survivors trapped inside their vehicles, surrounded by ravenous, unrelenting zombies.
In a perverted way, the scene reminded me of those camera-wielding paparazzi encircling hapless celebrities — only the zombies wanted a bit more than a salacious photo. The undead creatures craved organs, flesh, and blood — and they wouldn’t leave until they’d devoured their fill. It was a waiting contest: the zombies would eventually claw their way inside or the humans would inevitably starve to death. Either way, the zombies couldn’t lose.
It didn’t take much longer for me to accept the interstate wouldn’t work as a viable passage to Baton Rouge. Even assuming I could plow my way through most obstructions, I was bound to reach a point where even the van’s makeshift battering ram wouldn’t suffice.
Luckily, the I-10 wasn’t my only option. Before the interstate was constructed in the 1950s, the main route between New Orleans and Baton Rouge was Airline Highway, a rather schizophrenic thoroughfare known for golf courses, schools, various businesses, and prostitutes. Lots and lots of prostitutes.
It also happened to bypass the Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport — hence, the name. Even if Airline were relatively empty, it would take longer than an obstacle-free interstate, but it would certainly offer more turnarounds and side streets, enabling me with a way to avoid blockades and keep moving toward Baton Rouge.
I only hoped fifty thousand other people hadn’t made the same assessment.
Chapter 21
“You want me to salute that pile of walking pus? Salute my ass!”
– Captain Rhodes, Day of the Dead (1985)
The quickest way to exit the interstate was to put the van in reverse and retrace my route through the bodies, zombies, cars, and survivors. Out of habit, I glanced in my side-view mirror and noted a new wrinkle: at some point during my stop-and-go journey, a small BMW convertible had apparently trailed my path of destruction and now encroached upon my back end.
Seriously, who the fuck drives a soft-top convertible during a zombie apocalypse?
From what I could tell, a well-dressed, sixtysomething white man sat behind the wheel, while an attractive redhead, likely in her twenties, occupied the front passenger seat. As I rolled to a halt, shifted into reverse, and tried to assess my options, the jackass in the BMW honked his horn at me — possibly because he’d spotted my red taillights.
Had he learned nothing since the zombie virus had begun to spread throughout the city? Horns, gunshots, and other often avoidable sounds would only attract unwanted company.
I rolled down my window, just a crack, and yelled at him, “Hey, dumbass! Back up your stupid Beemer!”
As I’d feared, his relentless honking lured hordes of zombies from both directions. Fortunately, I managed to crank up my window just as an undead clown reached his blood-smeared fingers toward the gap. Azazel and I might’ve been safe for now, but a peek in my only functional side-view mirror told me a few of the zombies were already tearing through the cloth top of the convertible. The redhead — who was undoubtedly not the man’s daughter — shrieked and slapped her companion’s arm, probably trying to compel him to move the fucking car.
Still, desp
ite the urgency of the situation, the entitled idiot staunchly refused to put the fucking car in reverse. Hastily, I unbuckled my seatbelt and stepped to the rear of the van, where I plucked the shotgun from beneath the tarp and loaded it with shells from a nearby drawer. When actually loaded, the 12-gauge shotgun could be a deadly weapon — not just a pseudo Wild West prop, like back in the parking lot.
Through the smudged windows of the rear doors, I noted three zombies clawing at the roof of the BMW. The redhead, whom I could barely see through the car’s windshield, had apparently tilted her seat all the way back, so the first zombie who managed to slip his arm into the vehicle (a particularly eager postal worker) couldn’t quite grab her. Smart girl. She might even have a chance to live if she wriggled out of the situation and away from her dumbass sugar daddy.
Not surprisingly, the driver didn’t seem as quick-witted or resourceful. It appeared he hadn’t thought to lower his seat, and an obese female zombie had managed to reach through the roof, grasp a bunch of his salt-and-pepper hair, and yank him upward, as if to pull her meal through the slit in the soft convertible top. The third zombie, meanwhile, had clambered onto the hood and smeared his nasty face against the windshield. I wasn’t entirely sure what he was trying to do. He’s a zombie, so who the fuck knows?
Normally, I would’ve tried to figure out a way to avoid putting myself at risk for an ignorant stranger. But despite the durability of my van, the rear bumper hadn’t been reinforced like the front — and since it wasn’t a monster truck — I didn’t think reversing over the BMW was an option. So, I chambered a shell and opened one of the back doors. I had to be efficient and take care of business quickly — before the zombies still lingering by my driver’s-side window found their way to the open rear door.
Raising the shotgun, I aimed the barrel at the zombified mailman still trying to reach the redhead, and pulled the trigger. The creature’s skull exploded with the blast, leaving only its lower jaw attached to the rest of its body. As its knees buckled, its arm slipped free of the top, and the former postal worker toppled onto the concrete.
Meanwhile, I chambered another shell and swung the shotgun toward the undead fat lady still attempting to tug the driver through the roof. As I pulled the trigger, the creature moved her head just enough to avoid a kill shot. Still, the shell tore through her left shoulder, promptly separating the arm that dangled through the convertible top from her torso. Though the zombie’s fingers still clutched the man’s hair — a real fucked-up instance of rigor mortis — the rest of the fat lady lost her balance and stumbled backward from the vehicle.
“Put your fucking car in reverse,” I shouted, noticing several more zombies headed our way. “Now!”
After that, I slammed and locked my back door. Through the glass, I watched the man fumble with something below the dashboard, presumably the gearshift, then the BMW jolted into reverse, causing the third zombie to roll from the hood onto the road.
With the zombie arm still flailing above the shredded roof, the convertible continued reversing all the way to the Orleans Avenue entrance ramp — the same one I’d used to get on the stupid interstate. Unfortunately, the two disgruntled zombies behind my van righted themselves, just as a couple additional zombies, groaning loudly, appeared from either side and banged on the reinforced doors.
My turn to get the hell outta here.
I darted back to the driver’s seat, set the shotgun on the floor, and buckled my shoulder harness, then I shifted my rig into reverse and hit the gas. I felt several thumps as the van flew backward. Presumably, I’d crushed at least a couple of the zombies lingering behind my rear tires, but I didn’t stop to make sure. I just kept my foot on the gas and used the driver’s-side mirror to maneuver around the cars and bodies lining my path.
Regretfully, I passed some of the trapped survivors, their faces a mixture of fear and hopelessness, but there was no way I intended to stop. It was a simple mathematical dilemma: I might’ve had a small arsenal in my van, but only one shooter, and I’d never be able to take down all the zombies surrounding those luckless victims before getting overwhelmed myself.
Eventually, I neared my turnoff and veered backward down the oval-shaped entrance ramp — not an easy feat for an awkward zombie-mobile. By the time I’d reached the bottom of the ramp, I noticed the man had parked the BMW on Orleans Avenue, stepped out of his vehicle, and started shaking the zombie arm loose from his head like a demented headbanger.
As I paused the van beside the BMW and considered an alternate route, the girl winked at me, slid into the driver’s seat, and shifted the gearstick. Then, before the man could stop her, she tore off down Orleans Avenue. No doubt she knew what I suspected: the rich guy couldn’t protect her. Not in this new world.
With a flabbergasted expression on his face and the stupid zombie arm still flopping above his head, he bolted down the street in his shiny loafers and struggled to chase the car on foot. Not once did the redhead stop — not even when a pack of undead ventured from a side street and hauled the moron to the asphalt.
Yep, that chick is definitely a survivor.
Chapter 22
“You think this is a fuckinʼ costume? This is a way of life.”
– Suicide, The Return of the Living Dead (1985)
Bypassing the mob of zombies feasting on the former BMW driver, I made a U-turn on Orleans Avenue and headed back toward the I-10 overpass. Now that I’d nixed the interstate as a possible route, I needed to rely on surface streets to reach Airline Highway — which meant venturing through a few neighborhoods many residents had considered sketchy and outright dangerous even before the walking dead had shown up.
Honestly, it had always amazed me how the city’s tourism industry never seemed to take a major hit from the high crime rate. Armed robbery, assault, rape, kidnapping, and murder had all been daily threats, no matter which neighborhood New Orleanians called home. Given how compact the town was — squished between Lake Pontchartrain and the Mississippi River — none of her neighborhoods had been immune to violence and crime.
What had really surprised me, however, was how skillfully the mayor, city council, NOPD, CVB, and Times-Picayune staff had kept a lid on the ugly statistics — at least on a national level. A barbaric gang of thugs could rob several couples at gunpoint in the Garden District or French Quarter or Marigny, and still, the tourists and conventioneers had continued to pour into the city: many because they hadn’t heard about NOLA’s high crime rate, and others because they simply didn’t care. The Big Easy offered too many temptations to ignore.
Don’t get me wrong: despite the crime, the floods, the humidity, and the damn mosquitoes, I love New Orleans. I love her live music — the blues and the old-time jazz — and her incredible cuisine. I love the unwavering spirit of her citizens. I love her resiliency — and the way the so-called City That Care Forgot rose from the ashes of numerous fires and hurricanes and floods, a few wars, even a yellow fever epidemic. I love how she always managed to rebound from any hardship… but I guess the accurate term now would be “loved.” Past tense.
I loved the Big Easy, and I knew she’d never recover from this zombie apocalypse. Doubt any city could.
Turning right onto North Claiborne Avenue, which ran alongside the interstate, I caught a glimpse of the vibrant murals on the concrete columns beneath the overpass. I sure would miss the art, music, movies, and books the one-of-a-kind city had inspired during her more than three centuries of existence. There had never been any place like her — and there never would be again.
As I passed the brick walls of St. Louis Cemetery No. 2, I noticed a massive cluster of zombies in the road ahead. Afraid to press my luck against such a mob, I took a right onto Bienville Avenue and did my best to maneuver around the cars, bodies, and undead peppering the street.
Driving through the Tremé certainly differed from walking across the French Quarter. It wasn’t just the architecture, but the condition of the houses that varied. Overall, French Qua
rter denizens had more money to maintain their structures and landscaping, so while I’d spotted a few burning buildings over there, the entire Tremé seemed to be ablaze. Sadly, the homes had lit up like kindling, the flames searing a path through the historic neighborhood.
On either side of Bienville, buildings smoldered and burned, making the air so thick with smoke that visibility became a real issue. As I crept up the avenue, wary of obstacles and lamenting the loss of an entire culture, I reflected on all the amazing experiences Clare and I had shared in the Tremé. Sampling down-home Creole food at Dooky Chase’s. Catching a painted coconut at the Krewe of Zulu parade. Even watching a few second lines.
Traditionally, walking brass band parades in New Orleans were composed of two lines: the first, typically including the brass musicians and the club members who’d paid for the parading permit, and the second, consisting of those merely following the parade, relishing the music, clapping and dancing in the streets. No big surprise: during such events, second lines usually multiplied in size until they grew much larger than the original parade.
For decades, New Orleanians had used first and second lines to celebrate someone’s life after he or she had died. In the Tremé, the saddest of such jazz funerals came after the shooting death of a child or teenager. Even then, though, it could be both somber and energetic — and always a memorable way for people to mourn the loss of their loved one.
Usually, the brass band would lead the mourners up and down the streets, playing traditional tunes like “In the Sweet By and By” and “When the Saints Go Marching In,” luring others along the way, inspiring them to dance (and, naturally, drink) in celebration of life. Not disrespectful but, rather, expected and encouraged.
Zombie Chaos Book 1: Bloodbath in the Big Easy Page 11
