Parish by Nicole Murphy Read Free Book Online Page B

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                  “Oh no!” Emily belted out as she grabbed the dashboard. “We have to go back to the hospital!  We forgot Burt!”
                  “That drunk doctor that was sleeping under his desk?” Artemis asked.
                  “Yes.” She nodded vigorously.
                  “Look, I like ya doc, you seem like a real nice lady.  I don’t mind helping you to go get your family and all and I want to do it, but that old man will just slow us down.  I ain’t going back there, you saw what it was like.  That’s like asking for a hole in the head, lady!” Artemis pressed the accelerator a little more causing the vehicle to speed up.
                  “This is so wrong.” Emily crossed her arms over her chest and rubbed the upper portion of her arms.
                  “There ain’t nothing right about any of this.” Artemis snorted.  “We gotta get out of the city, it ain’t safe here.  Hell, I don’t know if there’s anywhere that’s safe right now.  All of the communication stopped a while ago.”  The vehicle lurched as he ran over several of the animated dead that were stumbling their way down the street.  Emily grimaced as she watched the corpses disappear beneath their vehicle.
                  “Maybe we would be safe if we went to the swamp?” She suggested, half-jokingly.
                  “At this rate you probably right, doc.  I think I’d rather take my chances with an alligator than one of those things.” He pointed out of the window to a handful of the zombies that were bent over a body in the street cramming intestines and other innards into their gnashing gnawing mouths. “How far you live from here?”
                  “About ten minutes, we’ll be there soon.” Emily replied as she looked away from the horror of the human buffet spread out on the road.
                  “Heya, doc, is there another way to get there?” Artemis asked, concern and hesitation evident in his voice.
                  “This is the quickest way, why?” Emily sat up and looked out before them.  The street was packed with more zombies than she could count.  Slowly there were turning around, their hunger leading them to the nearest thing making a sound, the roar of the engine.  “Back up! Back up!” She was getting hysterical.
                  “Which way?” Artemis asked as he turned the when harshly causing the vehicle to do a 180 and they were now facing the way they had just come.
                  “Go back and take the second right!” Emily was pointing forward although she was now turned around in her seat and looking behind them.  The zombies were shuffling in their direction, arms outstretched.
                  They barreled down the street.  A few people were attempting to pack their cars, some sat high up on balconies drinking and mocking those who were being attacked as they shoved their big screen televisions and one cup fancy coffee makers into their SUV’s.  The screams of the dying intermingled with jeers from the drunks and growls from the hungry.
                  “Look!” Artemis pointed to the roof of a one story building.  Emily quickly looked in the direction he was pointing.  Atop the roof sat a woman, three young children and in her arms was an infant.  She was clutching the baby to her chest and screaming for help.  The tears streaming down her cheeks were visible even at this distance.
                  “Just keep going.” Emily forced herself to look away and down at her hands which still clutched the bloody knife.  The woman’s screams for help, combined with her children wailing in terror had been the dinner bell for all the undead within earshot and they had begun to converge on the house, their mutilated