by John Varley
Many cats, of course, could fend for themselves, finding small rodents when they had to.
“Look on the bright side,” he said. “It definitely wasn’t human.”
They continued on Washington Boulevard, looking to the northeast every time they crossed a street, seeing each street blocked by the remains of the I-10. They got to Figueroa and could see from there that the 110 Harbor Freeway was blocked, too, from a collapsed overpass. The 110 was not elevated on pillars like the I-10, it traveled on an earthen berm except for when it crossed streets, but the berm was too steep to climb safely and they didn’t know what was on the other side.
“I wonder how far south we’d have to go to get past that?” Dave said.
“Or would you prefer to go back to the 5?”
“I hate to go back…but we may have no choice.” He studied his GPS. As soon as he had identified Georgia Street as the last one before the 110, the unit gave a little beep and shut itself off. Dead battery.
On Hill Street the city had parked a lot of buses under the freeway. The freeway had fallen on them…but not crushed them completely. They went down the lines, and at one point Dave could see all the way through between two lines of crushed buses.
“It wouldn’t be too hard for somebody on foot to climb over what’s left of the freeway,” he said, “but with the scooters, I don’t want to chance it.”
“So you want to go through there?”
“It’s that or go all the way back. Look at the sky. It’ll be dark in a few hours.”
“You know I don’t like…” She didn’t finish, but he knew his wife was a little claustrophobic. For that matter, he wasn’t thrilled by close spaces, either. There was at least ten feet between the lines of buses, but at some points the concrete slabs didn’t look much more than five feet high.
“There’s no telling what might be in there,” Karen said.
“Would you want to stay in there, with a thousand tons of broken concrete hanging over you?”
“I don’t even want to run through it.”
“It’ll take two minutes.”
“How about south, and find a way across the 110?”
“We could do that, but we don’t know how far it’ll be. Going back is a known quantity. We know it’s clear, and pretty much how long it will take.”
“Which could be too long. I don’t want to be out after dark, and we promised Addison.” She sighed. “Let’s do it.”
They got off the scooters and pushed them.
It got very dark. There were chunks of concrete they had to go around, but they found no impassable spots. Halfway in, the bad odor they had been smelling got more intense.
“Oh, God, that’s awful,” Karen whispered.
Dave saw them first, three bodies piled up between buses, almost invisible in the darkness. He heard a sound he didn’t like, and shined his flashlight into the crack.
There was a large dog, a pit bull mix, tearing at one of the corpses. Dave felt his gorge rise, but kept it down.
The dog looked at them, then back at his meal, and seemed to decide they might take it from him. He snarled, and crouched down. Dave reached for his shotgun.
“I think we better—”
The sound of Karen’s shotgun going off was beyond deafening. It sounded like the whole world had exploded.
“Jesus, Karen!”
He found he had dropped his flashlight. He picked it up and shined it into the gap where the bodies were. The thing in there no longer looked like a dog.
Dave gestured toward the far end of the tunnel. Karen nodded, and they quickly pushed their scooters into the light. Dave put down his kickstand and sat on a piece of concrete. Karen seemed a lot calmer than he would have expected. His own hands were shaking.
“Suddenly I have to pee, real bad,” Karen said.
“I think I already did.”
She laughed, and he laughed, and it relieved the tension a little.
“I’m not going back in there,” she said, firmly. “I want you to watch out here, see if any people come. And don’t look.”
“I promise. I hope you’ll warn me next time. Like, ‘I’m going to shoot.’ Something like that.”
“I thought he started toward us.”
“I’m not complaining. Not too much. You did the right thing. I’m sort of surprised it hasn’t affected you more.”
“It’s not much different from shooting a deer. Well, except for the head exploding. I shot a few deer with my dad when I was growing up. I didn’t even have to think about it. Now shut up, I’m having a hard time getting started here.”
Dave did that, and finally she joined him again.
“My turn,” he said.
He baptized the rear end of a squashed Metro bus, zipped up, and joined her.
They found themselves blocked in many places by fallen buildings, massive piles of brick that had completely blocked streets. There were also a large number of cracks, some of them running right through buildings that had not collapsed, but now looked as if someone had sliced into them with a giant cleaver.
They made their way to Figueroa again, and motored past the Convention Center and the Staples Center. The Convention Center looked like a squashed tin can, and the smell coming from it was intense. It would be easy to believe that thousands had died there as the refugee center turned into a death trap.
As they got farther downtown they saw more and more rubble on the streets. Entire brick walls had peeled away from the older buildings. But most of all they saw glass. The shards were piled three and four feet high in some places, and reached outward to meet another pile in the middle of the street. They had to go very slowly. Most of the north–south streets were impassable except to a tank with steel treads.
“I can’t imagine what this must have been like, coming down,” Karen said.
“Anybody on the street would have been sliced to pieces,” Dave agreed. “The only good thing about this whole business is that it was just after midnight.”
They saw no one on the streets.
“I guess the people in the condos and lofts have left,” Karen said. She was referring to the people with money, the ones who had in recent years moved into the pricey accommodations of the “new downtown,” mostly older buildings renovated and equipped with the sort of luxuries up-and-coming young professionals demanded.
“Not much for them here now.”
Blocked at turn after turn, they eventually did intersect with Broadway, and found that a reasonably clear lane had been bulldozed down the center. They followed it from Olympic to Fourth, and on toward Third. To their amazement, the Grand Central Market was open. They slowed down. Around a hundred people were sitting or standing on the street, eating fruits and vegetables.
“Let’s stop here a minute,” Karen said.
Dave raised his eyebrows at her, but turned off his motor. She put hers on the kickstand, then entered the open building. An elderly man approached Dave.
“You wouldn’t have a smoke, would you?”
“Sorry, man. Gave it up years ago.”
“Looks like I’m doing that, too, whether I want to or not.”
“You’ll be happy when you get through it.”
“Right now I’m a fucking wreck.”
“So what’s happening in there?”
“Salvation Army,” the man said. “They set up here and there in the city. It’s the new game in town: figure out where the Army’s going to be tomorrow. They’re a lot better than the real fucking army, which has done fuck all, seems to me.”
“Any idea where they’re getting their food?”
“They aren’t saying. People found out where, they’d probably swamp the place. So far it’s been enough to keep me alive, because other than that, I ain’t got nothing. And I want a hamburger, and most of all I want a smoke!”
After ten minutes Karen left the market. She was carrying a white plastic bag and looking a little guilty. She straddled her scooter and started it up.
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“What you got there?”
“A head of lettuce and two soft tomatoes.”
“What did you use for money?”
“They’re not taking money. And I didn’t want to take this but they pressed it on me. All they asked was ‘How many in your family?’ and the next thing I knew I was holding a bag of veggies. I tried to hand it back but they hurried me along.”
“I’m not going to say you shouldn’t have taken it.”
“I know I shouldn’t. But the idea of a salad…well, I gave up.”
“It sounds good to me, too.” And it did. His mouth was watering, and he had never been a big salad eater. It was funny how if you hadn’t had anything for a long time, it sounded better than it had ever actually been.
“They had apples and oranges, other greens, turnips, stuff like that. All of it was stuff I’d have complained to the manager about at Whole Foods a few months ago. It sure did look good now, though.”
“I could go for a fresh apple.”
“Me, too. But these people here don’t have what we have. I think I ought to give this bag to somebody else.”
“You probably should.”
They were both silent for a moment, then Karen shrugged, opened the hard-case pannier on the back of her scooter, and put the bag inside.
“And you know what? You’re going to laugh, but it felt good to be doing a little shopping again. Sort of.”
Dave didn’t laugh, but he grinned at her.
“Why would I laugh? You were always an Olympic-class shopper, whether it was looking for bargains when we were poor, or big-time when you had a purseful of platinum cards. You don’t want to lose your edge.”
She stuck her tongue out at him, and this time he did laugh.
The Bradbury Building looked basically intact.
A few of the stone trimmings high up had broken off, and many of the windows were broken, but it was still standing tall. Well, fairly tall for 1893, which was when it had been built. It was a Los Angeles landmark whose marble, tile, and cast-iron interior atrium could be seen in movies as varied as Bladerunner, Wolf, and Good Neighbor Sam. It would have been awful to lose it. Dave reminded himself again that buildings just didn’t matter when compared to the human loss; nevertheless, he was happy to see it.
Karen had suggested they go to the police department downtown to see if they had any advice both for the trip back to Doheny and the trip out of Los Angeles.
They rounded the corner two blocks away, drove another block, and soon they could see the new police headquarters. It was a skeletal, burned-out ruin. Like so many other buildings they had seen, there was no evidence of any attempt to fight the fire. Every window was blown out and the flames had worked their way up. The white façade facing First Street, directly across from City Hall Park, was cracked and blackened, with large parts fallen into the plaza below.
Across the street the old Parker Center had been heavily fortified, encircled with empty city buses. Police were coming and going. They were on foot, on bikes, and in a motley collection of trucks that had been modified to burn wood, then painted black. Some had light bars on the roofs, but most had nothing but LAPD stenciled on the doors.
There were half a dozen officers standing around the entrance in body armor. Some of the clothes were torn here and there. One female officer had bandages on her arms, and a man had a bandage around his head. They all looked tired, and they all had some indefinable thing in their eyes that said “Fuck with me, even a little bit, and you are dead meat.” Dave was careful to keep his hands well away from his own guns.
They pulled up, not too close, and cut their engines. Dave was about to speak, but Karen got there before him, asking if there was a way over the 110. One of the officers said there was, but it was pretty much all the way to Echo Park. The bridges near downtown were all either fallen or too damaged for vehicles.
“You might make it over them on foot, or on those scooters,” he said, “but I wouldn’t want to try it. Where are you headed?”
“West Hollywood,” Dave said.
“Your best bet is to cross the 110 at Wilshire,” the man said. “Some of the roads have been plowed free of debris. Go back the way you came and take Broadway down to Fourth, turn west, go all the way to Lucas, turn south. All the bridges are either intact or cleared away.”
“A little less gang activity there, going through Koreatown,” the woman officer said.
“She’s right. The Koreans are keeping it relatively safe.”
“Thanks so much, guys,” Karen said. “And thank you for the job you’re doing.”
“I second that,” Dave said.
“Thank you, ma’am. But you’d better get moving. After dark we don’t even patrol anymore except around the hospitals and refugee centers. You do not want to get caught out after dark.”
They asked about routes out of the city, but none of the cops there knew anything useful. They thanked them again, and moved on.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Dave knew the Koreatown neighborhood reasonably well, but the quake had picked everything up, shaken it around, and dropped it all back in such a jumbled manner that it was often difficult to keep track of exactly where they were. Many street signs had been buried in rubble. At times they were forced to rely on the position of the sun to orient themselves, moving steadily west and north.
“I feel like a rat in a maze,” Karen finally said.
“I’d give anything I own for a cell phone,” Dave said. He was imagining Addison, remembering the promise he had made to her. And there was nothing he could do to speed their progress.
Halfway down one block two young men who looked Korean stepped out into the street. They had already passed two neighborhood checkpoints and been waved on by some older Korean men. The street was lined on both sides with high-density housing, apartment blocks four or five stories high, most of them with a tiny balcony, most of them with large cracks in their walls.
The young men—just kids, really, looking to be in their late teens—wore sleeveless T-shirts and had prison tattoos on their arms and fingers, and one had some on his neck. Their hair was cut short and spiked with gel. They wore jeans and expensive running shoes that looked brand-new. One had a revolver stuck in the waistband of his jeans, and the other was carrying a shotgun resting easily on his shoulder.
“Hey, dude, I like your bikes,” one of them said, as Dave and Karen stopped about twenty yards from them.
“Thanks,” Dave said. “We like them, too.”
“Nice day for a bike ride,” the kid went on. “How much you take for them?”
“I’m afraid they’re not for sale.” Dave had his shotgun in his hands, and he could see from the corner of his eye that Karen did, too. It was pointing forward, but not directly at the boys. He was hoping they could get by these punks without any violence, but he was ready for anything.
“Ah, c’mon, dude. We got money. Our money ain’t good enough for you?”
“I told you, they’re not for sale.”
“How about you let me take a ride? I always wanted to ride one of them things, till I can afford me a Harley. Just around the block. What do you say?”
“We’re really in a hurry,” Dave said.
“Don’t look around,” Karen said, from the corner of her mouth. “Behind us.”
Dave glanced in his mirror and saw the head of a third boy looking out from between two parked vehicles. The very end of a rifle barrel was sticking out, too.
“If he comes out,” Dave whispered back, “shoot him.”
“Hey, what you guys talking about?” the first kid said.
“Listen, we don’t want any trouble,” Dave told him. “These guns are loaded.”
“I’ll bet they are.” This was the second guy, the one with the handgun, who hadn’t had anything to say up to then. “And you know what? Nice white folks like you? I bet you won’t shoot. Shooting gets messy, you’d lose your lunch.” He pulled the gun from his belt and was rais
ing it, holding it sideways like he’d seen guys do it in the movies, three of his finger sticking up in the air. “So why don’t you—”
Dave shot. The load went off a bit to one side of where he had been aiming, and ripped out a large part of the guy’s chest on his right side, perforating his gun arm as well. The pistol went flying as the guy fell. Dave racked in another load and saw Karen twisting and bringing her own gun up. There was another shot. Dave didn’t look behind him. The first kid was trying to get his shotgun aimed at Dave, but he had been badly spooked by the first shot, and he missed his grab for the barrel. He fumbled so badly, in fact, that the shotgun went clattering to the street.
Dave heard screaming behind him, but kept his own gun centered on the kid who was still standing. The kid held his hands out in front of him as if to stop the next shot he knew was coming. A dark stain spread in the crotch of his jeans. Behind him, the screaming got worse.
“Does he still have his gun?” Dave asked, without looking around.
“No, he…” Karen’s voice was shaky. “He’s not in any shape to shoot.”
“Okay. Look around at the apartments. See anybody at the windows?”
The unhurt kid dropped to his knees and was trying to say something, but it came out incoherent, or possibly he was speaking Korean.
“To your right, third floor,” Karen said. Dave looked that way quickly, keeping his shotgun on the kid, wishing he had eyes in the back of his head. He saw the face of a black woman peering over the top rail of a balcony.
She moved out a little and showed her hands.
“I ain’t armed!”
“Keep your hands in sight, then.”
She pointed at the kid on his knees.
“Kill that motherfucker!”
This brought a fresh burst of sobbing from the kid.
