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  Yet there was no good outcome here. This man, whoever he was and whatever life he’d led, didn’t exist in the same way anymore. The only thing Ritz could hope to do was ease some of the pain the man must be experiencing, give him comfort on some level.

  The man’s grip, already slight, weakened further. There was no pressure from the man’s fingers anymore. His eyes slowly blinked; his mouth open and closed. The morphine was taking hold. He held the man’s hand, ignoring the rise in shouting behind him, and noticed a strobing red light reflect on the victim’s face and torso. The light was filling the cabin of the car.

  Ritz glanced over his shoulder through the cracked windshield and saw a parade of rescue units—four ambulances and a supervisor’s SUV—moving toward Sunset.

  The yelling and shouting he’d heard was actually a swell of cheering and applauding. Ritz was confused by it at first. There was essentially no communication. How had they found them?

  He let go of the man’s hand, rested it on his chest, and moved clear of the crowd gathered behind him, heading toward the lead vehicle, the SUV. He didn’t recognize the crew.

  “What’s going on here?” asked the driver when Ritz neared. He was older than Ritz, his brown hair accented with gray at the temples, his tanned face weathered.

  “MVA,” said Ritz. “Some moron tried going around the gridlock, hit several people. We’ve got fractures, internal injuries. Seven patients total. Six on the ground and one still in a car. He’s stuck in the vehicle. Severe head trauma. Probably won’t make it.”

  “What about the others?”

  “Survivable,” said Ritz. “If you can get them help, it’d be a lot better.”

  The driver instructed the firefighter in the passenger seat to grab some gear, tell the others the situation, and start helping people.

  “How did you—”

  “We’ve been traveling through neighborhood streets,” he said. “Some are gridlocked; some of them aren’t that packed. It took us four hours to go a half mile. We’ve been jumping curbs, doing whatever we have to do.”

  “No,” said Ritz, “how did you know to come here? Are your radios working?”

  The driver laughed. “No. No external comms at all. Our handhelds are dead for the most part. We’re winging it, man.”

  “Where are you headed?”

  “A fire a couple of miles east. There are multiple injuries,” he said. “There’s a fire here, and nobody’s fighting it.”

  “Nobody can get here,” Ritz said. “Command likely doesn’t even know it’s burning.”

  “They know,” said the supervisor. “No doubt. They’ve got satellites telling them everything. My guess is they can’t get any assets here, especially with the primary radio system not operational.”

  A group of well-equipped firefighters raced past them with stretchers and medic bags.

  Ritz tapped one on the arm and pointed toward Phyllis and Lardie. “They can guide you to the most critically injured first.” He turned back to the supervisor. “So what do we do to help these people?”

  “We’re gonna turn around,” said the supervisor. “I’m going to try to get all these units back to Reagan or the VA, whichever hospital I can reach. Cedars Sinai is too far. There’s too much fire between here and there. Not even sure I can get back to Westwood.”

  “The injured will still be better off with you than on the street,” said Ritz. “It’s incredible luck that you wandered here.”

  “I guess,” said the supervisor. “We’re on hour fifteen. You?”

  “I don’t even know,” said Ritz. “It’s all a blur.”

  “What are you going to do now?” asked the supervisor. “I mean, once we head out. You and your team wanna ride?”

  “No. I’m good here.”

  The supervisor leaned out of his window, eyeing Ritz up and down. “You don’t look so hot. Your coloring is lousy. I’m guessing you’re dehydrated. You could get checked out too if we find a way to an ER.”

  Ritz declined again. “No, I’ll be fine. We’ll be fine. My job’s to help people, not be sitting in an ER getting attention others need more than I do.”

  Two of the firefighters rolled a gurney past them toward the back of the nearest ambulance. The man with two broken legs was aboard. Ritz shouted after them that he’d administered morphine.

  “You’re a good man,” said the supervisor. He held out his hand. “I’m John Mubarak. Station 92 over off Pico. You?”

  “Ritz. Station 19.”

  “Like the cracker?”

  “Like the hotel.”

  Mubarak laughed and scratched the stubble on his chin. “We’ll get through this,” he said. “One way or the other.”

  Ritz offered the best smile he could muster. There was smoke in all directions. He agreed they’d get through it one way or the other, though there were so many possibilities that lay within those two options he couldn’t know which one would find them.

  “I’m going to touch base with each of your guys before you head out,” said Ritz. “Make sure they know what we’ve done before they start the real work.”

  Another gurney passed the SUV, and Mubarak reached down to the floorboard of the passenger’s seat, pulling out a pair of bottled waters. “Sounds good,” he said, handing them to Ritz. “Be careful out there, Ritz like the hotel. And always remember one thing…”

  “Thanks.” Ritz took the waters then asked, “What am I supposed to remember?”

  “Play the lottery before every shift starts and after it ends,” he said. “’Cause every shift you survive is another chance to hit it big.”

  Ritz toasted Mubarak with one of the bottles. “Good advice. Thanks again for getting these vics. They need your help.”

  “It’s not like we can get to that other fire anyhow,” he said. “That call was four hours ago, before the comms died.”

  Ritz nodded and walked back through the crowd toward Phyllis. She was at the car with the head-trauma victim. When he reached her, she was closing his eyes with her fingers. She shook her head.

  He paused, gripping the bottles of water more tightly, feeling the condensation in his palms. His body quivered, and he was suddenly paralyzed, stuck in that spot on the side of the road. Chaos still looking for order all around him, he focused on the man behind the wheel, the man whose name he didn’t know but whose life he’d tried to save.

  Ritz had seen so many horrible things in his years as a firefighter. He’d witnessed the worst of people and the best of them, the cowards and the heroes, the evil and the benevolent. As a first responder, he had a uniquely clear window into the soul of man and what he could do when pushed to the extremes.

  He’d seen countless deaths while saving as many if not more lives, but this one was tough. Maybe it was because it was the most recent. Or perhaps it was because of what the death represented on this unreal day.

  The man behind the wheel had seen someone hurting others, had chosen to take action at great risk to himself, and sacrificed his own life in the process. Ritz’s weight sank into his feet. He wanted to move. He wanted to run. He wanted to be on that sofa in station 19 doing nothing.

  More than anything though, he wanted to help people. In this untenable, disintegrating environment, it was becoming increasingly difficult to find ways to do that.

  Phyllis pushed back from the car and walked the short distance back to him. She must have seen the abject confusion on his face, because she reached out and wrapped her arms around him, drawing him close.

  “You did everything you could, Ritz. You’re a hero. You’ve proven it time and again.”

  He didn’t feel like one, despite the growing sensation in his gut that somehow all of this was a test, part of a grander scheme by a deity neither good nor bad but all-powerful. His mind told him he was doing good.

  When Phyllis let go of him, he thanked her. He returned the compliments as Lardie approached, his hands and shirt bloodied from his work.

  “Your gear is over ther
e,” said Lardie. “Your jacket and your bag. They’re still on the ground. You want me to get ’em? You don’t look so good.”

  Ritz shook his head. “I’ll get them, thanks.”

  “Where to next?” asked Lardie.

  “Wherever we’re needed,” said Ritz. “I bet we could toss a rock and find someone who needs help.”

  Lardie said something to Phyllis as Ritz walked away. He wasn’t close enough to the exchange, nor did he care about its content. He was focused on getting his belongings, weaving amongst the obstacles in his way until he reached them.

  He bent over, his ribs reminding him how injured he was, and picked up his jacket. He put it on, careful not to stretch too much as he eased his arm inside the heavy, fire-resistant fabric. He slung the bag over his shoulder and sucked in a breath, exhaled, and surveyed the scene around him once more.

  He’d started walking back toward Phyllis and Lardie when he felt something on his face. It was cold, and it was wet. He reached up, his fingertips finding the droplet clinging to his cheek, and wiped away the drop of moisture. Another drop hit him on the face. Ritz eyed what he thought might be storm clouds on the horizon and grinned.

  CHAPTER 18

  Friday, October 17, 2025

  Santa Monica, California

  Danny was agitated. He wanted to crawl out of his skin and run screaming into the roiling ocean, diving headfirst into the breaking waves, never resurfacing.

  Another shoulder bumped against him. Someone’s blowing hair brushed against his face. Kicked sand sprayed across his legs.

  The beach was swarming with so many people it was difficult to move. Danny did not like crowds. Every brush or spray or bump was more painful than the last.

  They hadn’t expected the crowds on the beach. They’d thought it would be an easier path toward whatever safe haven it was that Gilda had them looking for. That wasn’t the case.

  Even in the shallows of the tide at the water’s edge, there were masses of people walking in both directions. Many of them carried their shoes in their hands. Parents held children on their shoulders or on their hips as they trudged in both directions along the water’s edge.

  It was the safest place to be with flames and smoke so close. There was no way, regardless of how out of control a fire might become, that it would burn its way across the wide, pale stretch of beach and into the Pacific.

  The congestion was all along that stretch of beach. From the edges of the properties that lined PCH to the ocean, people moved and stood still.

  “Something wrong?” asked Gilda. She was walking next to Danny and behind Arthur and Claudia.

  Danny shook his head. “No, why?”

  “Your fists are clenched at your sides,” said Gilda. “And you look like you’re about to bite through your teeth.”

  Danny checked his hands. He hadn’t even realized how tense he was. He relaxed his fists and flexed his fingers. Then he let his jaw slack and exhaled a breath he realized he’d been holding.

  “You’re wound pretty tight,” said Gilda.

  Danny hadn’t ever thought of himself as intense. He was the opposite, really. He suffered from a lack of assertiveness. He was the strong, quiet type. He didn’t want to betray his discomfort to Gilda; he didn’t know her well enough. Even if he had, he probably wouldn’t have opened up.

  “I guess,” he said. “Hard not to be on a day like this.”

  “That’s an understatement,” she said with a laugh. “You know, we spend a lot of time thinking about the what-ifs in life. Rarely do they ever happen.”

  Danny’s calves ached. Every step in the dry sand was a workout for his already sore legs. His heels dug in and he’d have to push harder to take the next step.

  “I’ve always been a glass-half-empty sort of person with a twist,” said Gilda. “You know?”

  He didn’t. She kept talking without waiting for his response.

  “I see the glass as half empty,” she explained. “I know I’ve got some water left, some time, to prepare for the glass to be bone dry. Know what I mean? I spend all my time thinking about that glass being empty and what I need to do before I run out of the half of a glass I have left. So I never really enjoy the water still in the glass. I’m too consumed with making sure I’ve got a way to replenish it when it’s gone.”

  She took long strides, unfazed by the crowds around them or the arduousness of the trek in shifting sand.

  “That’s a lot of thinking about a glass of water,” said Danny. “I mean, a lot of thinking. And you say I’m tightly wound?”

  She chuckled again. Her face was flushed, and she bit her lower lip, seeming to consider both what he’d said and her response.

  A large man in a tank top with a sunburn on his neck trudged past them, bumping into Danny. He apologized and kept moving. Danny’s body tensed and relaxed.

  Ahead of them, Arthur led Claudia through the crowds. They held hands, as they’d been doing much of the afternoon, and when they weren’t walking side by side, he was leading her through the openings that appeared and evaporated between the hordes blocking their paths.

  Gilda conceded. “Mainly I just like to think of myself as prepared. If I’m ready for whatever happens, it’s worth all of the stress leading up to it.”

  “Whatever happens,” said Danny, repeating her. “What exactly does that mean?”

  She shrugged. “Anything really. You ever heard of SHTF or TEOTWAWKI?”

  “I’ve heard of FUBAR,” said Danny. “Is it anything like that?”

  A stiff wind blew in from the ocean, and a chill raced through Danny’s body. He shivered and glanced in the direction of the wind. On the horizon clouds were gathering. Some of them appeared as dark as the columns of smoke that rose above western Los Angeles. He’d begun to think of those columns as a game of Whac-A-Mole. No sooner had one of them dissipated than two more appeared. Perhaps the clouds were a much-needed mallet that might clobber all the moles at once.

  Danny chastised himself in his head for the lame metaphor. Then he blamed Gilda. Her glass-of-water soliloquy had him thinking poetically. Poorly so.

  “More or less,” she said. “The first one has to do with stuff hitting the fan.”

  He was surprised she didn’t use what he now knew was the real S in that acronym. Gilda struck him as the kind of gal who’d have no problem with profanity. He didn’t mind that.

  “And the second?” he asked. “It sounds Native American.”

  She sidestepped a pair of children tugging at their mother’s legs and laughed. “It does, but no. It means The End Of The World As We Know It. TEOTWAWKI.”

  “Never heard of it. That’s a thing?”

  “Yeah, it’s a thing. It’s an industry. A subculture.”

  “Doomsdayers?” he asked. “Really? I never knew.”

  Gilda bristled, and her tone shifted. It was colder, like the wind, sending a chill down Danny’s neck and along the length of his spine.

  “We’re not doomsdayers,” she said. “We don’t go around preaching the end is nigh or any crap like that. You make it sound crazy.”

  “I didn’t mean—”

  “We’re prepared, that’s what we are. We plan for what will happen eventually. It could be a nuclear attack, a flood, a plague, financial meltdown, or even widespread fires. It doesn’t matter. Whatever it is, something apocalyptic is going to happen, and we are ready for it when others are not.”

  Danny stole glances over both of his shoulders, seeing the teeming unwashed masses of people walking toward their homes or somewhere else. None of them looked like they were prepared. They were stuck. They were victims of the fires. They probably hadn’t thought of glasses of water or SHTF or TEOTWAWKI or FUBAR. Yet they were in the same position, walking the same beach as the woman who made those considerations a part of her everyday life. He thought whether or not he should say something. She must have read his mind, because she went on.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” she began and refer
enced her traveling partners with a pointed, wagging finger. “I’m here with you and them, and you didn’t do anything to prepare. None of these people in this…this…this human tide did anything to be ready. Right?”

  He shrugged.

  “I figured,” she said. “Don’t think about what’s happening right now in the short term. Think long term. What do you do two or three days from now when the fires are still burning? Where do you go for food or water? How do you protect yourself when people start getting more desperate?”

  She motioned to the sea of bodies around them, shuffling and walking, bumping, and brushing. Danny followed her gestures, noticing the blank looks on people’s faces.

  “These people are thinking about getting home. They’re worried about their houses burning or their cars getting towed. They might be thinking about how to get their kids from daycare or what mess awaits them from a pet left inside the house for too long.”

  Danny thought about Maggie. He’d left her with plenty of food and water. She’d be okay for a couple of days, even if she soiled her crate. It wasn’t ideal, and he was pretty sure she was miserable and confused as to why he hadn’t come home. She was fine for now.

  Gilda continued, a hint of condescension in her voice now. “They don’t have a clue about what’s next, in the days and weeks still to come. I do. Although I might not be any better off than any of you in the effort to get safely to a waypoint, once I’m there, I’m golden for the foreseeable future. I’m set because I thought about the half-empty glass. I’m prepared. I have sustainable supplies of food, water, and energy. Do you?”

  He didn’t. He had a few cans of dollar-store soup in his otherwise empty pantry, and half of a six-pack of twelve-ounce water bottles in the refrigerator along with some ketchup and a box of leftover pizza delivery breadsticks.

  On the thrift-store milk crate that served as a bedside table to his mattress perched atop plywood and cinderblocks, he had a hand-crank flashlight and an external phone charger. Those would be good in an emergency. Danny did have two large bags of dog food for Maggie. He was more prepared for his dog than he was for himself. He didn’t say any of this to Gilda.