Los Angeles was not prepared for this. No city could be. No freeway was drivable, no buildings were okay, and many came down completely. Ninety-eight percent of the property in Los Angeles County was severely damaged.
The death toll was close to fifty thousand and the number of injured was incalculable. First reports said up to half a million people were seriously hurt. Hospitals could do nothing. They were damaged beyond repair; all they tried to do was keep the patients who were already there alive.
And then, after all was said and done, after all of the damage and death and destruction, there was one looming issue. Where in God’s name would the money come from to fix America’s largest city? For a country so deeply in debt, this seemed like an impossible task.
The nation’s largest insurance company simply declared bankruptcy. It had liability in the great quake of more than a trillion dollars. It couldn’t pay a hundredth of that. That was the problem with earthquake insurance: It was a good bet in a small quake where your house was damaged but the house down the street was fine. Then, after paying a large deductible, you were likely to see some money. When all the houses in the entire city were damaged, that equation didn’t work. State and federal aid would be bare minimum at best. To fix the highways alone would cost fifty times more than it did to build them.
But all that would have to wait. This was a true humanitarian crisis, the worst the United States had ever faced. In images beamed instantly all over the globe, California looked like a third-world country. People were lying in the streets, bodies piled up along the sidewalks; fires raged all over the city, and the possibility of severe outbreaks of disease grew by the hour.
* * *
The earthquake occurred at 6:36 A.M., Pacific Standard Time. At 9:36 A.M., Eastern Standard Time, President Bernstein was in the Oval Office drinking coffee, eating a jelly doughnut, and reading the morning briefings. His chief of staff, John Van Dyke, felt a tingling on his wrist. His communicator was set on “tickle” and he immediately looked at his watch. He gasped. Bernstein stopped reading and looked up. “What’s the problem?”
“A colossal earthquake.”
“Where?”
“Here, sir.”
“Here? I didn’t feel a thing.”
“In Los Angeles. A nine point one.”
“Come on. No. Jesus Christ!”
Bernstein pressed a button and the wall in front of him changed instantly into multiple screens. He could see anything he wanted. Every news outlet, his Joint Chiefs of Staff, NORAD, live cameras placed on top of government buildings in every city in America, images from space—it was his choice. For three minutes he just watched the same images being fed to every other American. Devastation not seen before by a U.S. president.
Bernstein was known for his calm. He didn’t show emotion in public very often and he even tried to keep it from his staff. But he felt he was losing it. He started to sweat and he could feel his heartbeat accelerate. “My God, John. What has happened? Is everyone sure this was an earthquake?”
“What do you mean, Mr. President?”
“Could this have been a nuclear explosion and people assumed it was an earthquake?”
“No, sir. It registered a nine point one on the Richter scale.”
“My God. My God.”
That’s all the president of the United States could muster as he watched one image after another of America’s biggest city in ruins.
* * *
Dr. Sam Mueller’s G10 landed at Reagan International Airport at eleven A.M. He had been in flight when the earthquake happened, and as soon as he touched down, he, too, watched the screen in the private terminal along with dozens of other rich people. His mind was racing. Will there still be a meeting? Can I do something to help? Is there an invention to be hatched here to deal with this crisis? It would sound cold to some, but Mueller’s mind had always worked that way. He hated when he saw tragedy and thought of business, but he convinced himself that was how the brains of brilliant people worked. Don’t beat yourself up for being brilliant.
* * *
The government was in full crisis mode. President Bernstein ordered half the National Guard to California. Every army base in the western United States sent all available manpower and resources to the coast. He asked General Robert Roscoe, assistant head of the Joint Chiefs, to get to Los Angeles as quickly as possible and coordinate the rescue effort. Bernstein wanted the army to set up as many temporary hospitals, which were really nothing more than large tents, as it had. He wanted them up and running immediately, and even though there wasn’t enough staff for all of them, he felt it was important for the public to see those images.
The first country to offer help was Canada. They sent thirty doctors, over a hundred nurses, and supplies. Mexico also offered assistance. Bernstein had to make a decision about whether he should go to California immediately, but it was felt that it would be best to let the military get its foot in the door and then he would fly out and tour the area. It was such a production to transport the president of the United States, and he didn’t feel Los Angeles needed to give its attention to him at this moment of crisis.
There was another major issue that required him to stay in Washington. In a disaster this size there was always a higher likelihood of trouble from either inside or outside the country. Individuals, even nations, can take advantage of a weakened adversary, so the President ordered the United States on highest alert. Police in other cities were on twenty-four-hour watch for suspicious activities, and the Strategic Air Command went to DEFCON 1, its war footing. America was immediately turned into a no-fly zone: For forty-eight hours all commercial flights were grounded, and it was ordered that anything in the sky would be shot down. Los Angeles was so crippled that even a small attack during this time would destroy it for good.
The President was leaving the Situation Room when John Van Dyke reminded him, “We have the health team all assembled here. Do you want to cancel it?”
“No,” said the President. “Make it for later, but don’t cancel. This isn’t exactly the health issue I wanted to talk about, but their advice will be important. Make it after lunch. Feed them, show them around, take them to the zoo, whatever you have to do, but give me a few hours to deal with this. Why don’t you make it for three o’clock?”
“Yes, sir.”
The President returned to the Oval Office and just watched the screens as they displayed devastation never seen before. At least this wasn’t my fault.
* * *
Kathy Bernard and Brian Nelson were sitting in her home in Indianapolis, watching the disaster. “I’ve always hated Los Angeles,” Brian said. “A bunch of rich perverts. They deserve it.”
Normally Kathy would correct him when he made those kinds of gross generalizations, but this was the last thing on her mind. All she could think about was her dad. “It’s not fair,” she said. “He was trying to make his payments. He’s still young, compared to all those fucking boomers who won’t die. Why should we pay the health care for someone who has already had ninety years of life and not my dad?”
“I’m with you,” Brian said. “I say kill all those old fuckers.”
They went back to watching the earthquake. Kathy felt a bit selfish watching such devastation and thinking only about her own problems, but to her a $350,000 debt was the same thing as a 9.1.
* * *
The watch on Dr. Mueller’s wrist lit up. It was his assistant in Florida.
“The President’s appointment secretary just asked if you could stay later. The President would like to meet at three.”
“Sure,” Sam said.
“What do we do in the meantime?” Maggie whispered, overhearing the watch. His assistant heard her.
“You are welcome to come to the White House now for lunch and a tour with the First Lady, or you can spend the day however you wish and arrive there shortly before the meeting.”
“We’ll go now and do the lunch and the tour,” Maggie said.
“You heard her,” Sam replied. “That’s the decision.”
“All right, sir. A driver is waiting for you. Did you see the earthquake in Los Angeles, Dr. Mueller?”
“Yes. Horrible.”
“Our office building and lab there were completely destroyed, but nothing dangerous was released. And thank God it was early, so no one was in the building.”
“I know,” Sam said. “Bob called me an hour ago. It’s lucky for us they make it too expensive to do business out there or we would have lost a lot more. I’ll check in with you later.”
Sam and Maggie got into the limousine.
“Where to, sir?”
“The White House.” That felt really cool. Some things never got old.
* * *
The Situation Room was fully active now, as if the country had been attacked. They watched secure feeds of information flowing in, getting the most up-to-the-minute counts on the dead and injured, and watched close-up pictures from space.
Bernstein could never get over these pictures. They weren’t new technology—this had been around for probably fifty years—but they kept getting better. Stupendously clear photos of the smallest objects, with the best sound you ever heard. You could read a Vehicle Identification Number on an automobile from fifty miles up. And you could hear the conversation in the same car. The government had to go through the motions of getting judicial approval to hear what people were saying, although visual spying was allowed—it was odd, you could see someone in bed, you just weren’t allowed to hear him without a court order—but the orders were easy to obtain, and most of the time the government listened anyway and got the permission later.
Today, however, they weren’t interested in conversations. This wasn’t about a conspiracy. It was about a catastrophe. The worst the nation had ever seen.
CHAPTER TEN
The United States had always felt it was just a matter of time before a nuclear device went off somewhere in the country. But its worst fears—that of a full-fledged bomb exploding—had not yet happened. When a dirty bomb exploded in Chicago in 2023, it was handled well. The thing about dirty bombs is that they leave large parts of real estate uninhabitable, but they don’t kill on a large scale.
People were scared to death when it happened, but the explosion itself was over before anyone knew there was radiation involved. The area, about one city block, was sealed off, and remained that way for five years until they were able, with the help of new chemicals, to cleanse the buildings of any measurable contamination. Still, no one moved back there. They almost had to give the land away and they were forced to put up a big electronic Geiger counter, like a billboard, that always registered zero, just to put people at ease. The area was affectionately known in the city as the Hot Zone, and some strip clubs and dance clubs actually made money there, with strippers known as “Xray” and “NewCleo.”
Other parts of the world were not that fortunate. People had always expected the first nuclear explosion to be in the Middle East when Iran got its weapon, or Pakistan or North Korea. But North Korea surprised everyone.
When Kim Jong Il died in 2013, the country fell apart and into the hands of the south. Over the next few years the two countries became one Korea with not only no resistance from the north but almost an attitude of gratefulness. The people in the north had nothing, knew almost nothing about the world, but knew from messages that had gotten through to them from relatives who had escaped a long time ago that they had it as bad as it could get. And once change was offered to them, they ate it up like starving animals.
Israel waited through 2011 as the United States talked to Iran and tried to present a face of progress, but Israeli spies knew the truth. Weapons were being constructed at the rate of one a month starting in January 2012. With help from double agents inside Iran and secret help from Egypt and Jordan—two Arab countries more scared of Iran than Israel, if that was possible—a massive strike was undertaken to set back Iran’s nuclear ambitions by at least a decade. It unleashed a conventional war that went on for almost six months, with tens of thousands of casualties and Arab nations fighting one another. The United States supplied weapons but refused to officially enter the conflict.
Fighting was brought to an uneasy truce toward the end of 2012, and for the foreseeable future Iran, other than by buying one off the black market, was not going to have its weapon. The odd thing was that as soon as fighting ceased, Israel went back to the same strained relationship it had had with Jordan and Egypt. They were there for each other in times of absolute crisis, but barring that, Jews were Jews and Arabs were Arabs, and that was not going to change.
Pakistan and India were not as lucky. By 2013 there was complete chaos in Pakistan. The Taliban, fighting the United States and NATO in Afghanistan, in a war that was making Vietnam look like a quickie, made their move to take over Pakistan once and for all. Slowly, each year, they gained the support of more of the people. Pakistan, unlike India, never distributed its wealth, and as the population got poorer and less educated, the Taliban took over more hearts and minds. The news reports that the Taliban had been driven out were true. Driven out of one place, but welcomed into another. Not dead and not gone. And when they’d become quiet for a few years, people made the big mistake of thinking the worst was over. But all they had done was go back into the population and fester. They cemented themselves with the millions of impoverished people and the thousands of soldiers who wanted a more religious state.
The Taliban made their move on Christmas Eve 2013, a date that meant nothing to them, almost as if to say to the Christian world, “Merry Christmas, you fuckers.” It was quick, coordinated beyond anyone’s wildest imagination, and because of the help they had within the army, relatively bloodless. By New Year’s Day 2014, Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal was under Taliban control. The remaining government basically surrendered without a fight. The rest of the world watched in horror as Sharia law was imposed on an entire nation. The Taliban immediately organized military parades, as they wanted Pakistan and the world to see thousands of people cheering for them in the streets. An Al-Qaeda bomb—actually, seventy of them—was finally a reality.
The United States went on highest alert, and war plans were discussed in case Pakistan had to be attacked before any of these weapons could be fired. But it was India that was truly petrified. Yes, the Taliban hated the U.S., but they hated India more. And, like all Pakistanis, they wanted the land they believed was rightfully theirs.
It only took two months in power before the first clash came in Kashmir. India noticed immediately that the Pakistani soldiers fought with a new intensity. Accompanying the fighting were strong warnings and threats coming from the Taliban government: “Give us this land, or else.” The last thing India wanted to do was now its only option.
Secret meetings were held with the United States, Germany, France, China, Japan, Russia, and the UK. None of these countries liked the new Pakistan, and only China and Russia, among the major powers, thought they could do business with its new government.
India said, and the intelligence backed them up, that it was going to be attacked with nuclear weapons and it had to strike first. The United States thought it was the right thing to do. China and Japan thought India should give it more time. Germany and France, with their large Muslim populations, were mixed in their reactions. They knew an attack would cause an uprising in the streets, but they were more scared of Taliban influence spreading into their own society.
The United States thought that India could dismantle Pakistan’s ability to strike back if it hit key facilities first, with bunker-buster nukes. These were still nuclear weapons, but they were exploded deep in the ground, not in the air, and they did phenomenal damage without catastrophic radiation release. There was no way to prevent Pakistan from firing something, but with advanced defense missiles and a population large enough that it could afford a million or so casualties, India convinced the rest of the world that it was now or never.
India’s first job was to try to put a government favorable to it in power. It found some Taliban who were friendlier to the idea than others and cultivated them, along with leaders in exile whom the people still had some affection toward. But no new government was going to get the nukes back. Those went to the victor, and for the first time in fifty years Pakistan had no weapons of mass destruction.
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