The remains of the 405 freeway twist through the city. From our vantage point, the thousands of abandoned vehicles on the interstate look like a mass of dead insects. Everything is gray. Morbid.
Quiet.
“You’ve never been to L.A. before?” I say.
“I’m from San Francisco,” Uriah replies. “Never traveled much.”
“Well,” I sigh. “Los Angeles wasn’t perfect…but it wasn’t like this, either.”
“This gives me the creeps,” Vera mutters. “Where is everyone? I thought L.A. was an Omega hotspot.”
“It is,” Manny replies, popping his flask open. “This was a city of ten million people — most of them either dead or fled. Now it’s an Omega base. They’re just not making themselves real visible.”
“Intelligence reports say that Omega troops are coming through the Port of Los Angeles, anyway,” Andrew adds. “That’s a few miles away. I don’t think Omega has enough troops to send out more than random patrols.”
“There’s no steel ring around this city,” Uriah remarks.
“We’ve brought you this far,” Father Kareem says. “You can find your way from here.”
I start, because I’d almost forgotten that the Mad Monks were still with us. In daylight, their clothes are bland. They blend in with the grass and shrubs along the mountains. I glance around, studying the men. The group is diverse, with ethnicities ranging from Indian to Korean. They almost seem like ghosts. Silent and stony. Unmoving. Father Kareem is the only one who has spoken to us since they walked us the three miles to the border of Toluca Lake.
“Thank you for your help,” I say. “This shortcut saved us hours.”
“Yes, it did.” He raises an eyebrow. “Commander?”
“Yes?”
He pauses. Then, “Bring Commander Young back alive.”
I stare at him. I’m not going to ask how he knows that we are here to rescue Chris. I’m not going to confirm or deny the information. I simply nod slowly, salute him, and watch as he silently returns to the hills. I watch all of them until they vanish from sight, reminding myself that yes — they were real. It wasn’t some kind of weird dream.
“Where are we meeting our Underground contact?” Vera asks.
“About a mile,” I say, pointing to portion of trees and burned houses in the distance.
“How far are we from Hollywood?” Andrew comments.
“Around seven miles, I think.” I shrug. “I never used to spend time in Hollywood, except on weekends. Sometimes I’d visit the Boulevard with friends and see a movie.”
Oh, those were the days.
And to think I used to complain about them.
“Lead the way, Manny,” I say.
He nods, slipping the flask back into his duster, keeping it folded inside of his flight cap. I ease Katana down the trail and we dip behind the mountain again, out of sight. We could shave a few hours off of our journey if we cut right down the mountain, but that would leave us exposed to anyone watching the hills.
And after all of the trouble we’ve had, the last thing I want is attention.
We push forward. The closer we get to meeting our contact, the more nervous I become. The hills become smaller, and we enter into a residential area. Toluca Lake, according to our maps. The houses are gorgeous. Mansions. Much of the shrubbery here is either overgrown or dead. Most of the houses have been vandalized. Streaks of graffiti line rooftops and fence posts.
“Do we ride on the road or what?” Andrew asks.
“I guess we don’t have a choice,” I shrug.
We take the horses down the street; hooves clip clopping against the asphalt. It’s a sound that probably hasn’t been heard in Los Angeles for a hundred years. It’s funny how things go full circle. You eliminate something from culture completely and then bam. Here it is again.
“This was super high end living,” Vera comments. “Toluca Lake was a celebrity city.”
“Yeah, I remember,” I say. “I used to visit this place with my mom.”
When I was a girl, we’d drive up and down every street, looking at the houses; pretending we were millionaires and that we could own any property we wanted. Come to think of it, it’s one of the only happy memories I have of spending time with my mother.
“What are you smiling about?” Manny asks.
“Nothing,” I whisper. “Just thinking.”
He raises an eyebrow. But he says nothing.
As we continue, I tighten my grip on Katana’s reins. The eerie silence of the neighborhood is creeping me out. The tension is thick in the air. At some point, something bad has to happen. It always does. I would be surprised if something didn’t happen.
I’m not exactly a good karma magnet.
“Woodbridge,” Manny announces. “We’re here.”
A faded, dark brown sign sits on the edge of an abandoned park. Trees and bushes are overgrown. The pond in the middle of the park — once beautiful and well maintained — has only a few inches of stagnant water remaining. Clouds of mosquitos hover over the surface.
“This used to be beautiful, too,” I remark.
Coming here and seeing it like this…well, it’s disturbing. I feel like I’ve fallen into the zombie apocalypse. We’re stuck in a different dimension, but it’s actually the sad reality.
“Stay on your horses,” Manny warns. “If we’ve played this right — and I think we have — our contact should be on the other side. By the playground.”
Vera mutters, “We come to Los Angeles and meet up with an Underground contact in front of playground equipment.”
“If it bothers you so much, you can always go back to Fresno,” Andrew snaps.
Vera looks surprised to hear him talk that way to her. Instead of coming up with a stinging retort, she shuts her mouth and sets her jaw. Silent mode.
Good. Silence is good.
And then I see him. He’s sitting on the edge of a park bench on the right of the playground equipment. He’s wrapped up in a black coat and scarf, watching us. Motionless. Behind him is a row of wrecked housing.
“Is that our man?” Uriah asks.
“I guess so,” I say. “There’s only one way to find out.”
Manny leads the way.
I bring Katana to a halt and dismount. The grass is dead — it snaps under my boots. The man on the bench doesn’t move. He stares at me, unmoving.
As I get closer, Katana hesitates. I catch a whiff of something. It’s probably the stagnant pond — setting water smells disgusting.
“I’m Yankee One,” I say, palms up. “And this is my team.”
The man doesn’t move. In fact, he doesn’t even blink.
I step closer. His skin is pale. I sniff the air.
Oh, God. One eye is red and glassy, and I notice a purple bruise on the side of his face. He’s dead.
“That is disgusting,” Vera complains.
“So much for our contact,” Uriah says. He dismounts his horse and studies the corpse. “He’s been dead for a couple of days — no longer than that.”
“Do you think Omega did this?” Vera wonders.
“No. Gangs, most likely,” Manny replies. “If it were Omega, they would have questioned and tortured him before he died. This fellow looks like he was hit in the head once.” Manny examines the dead man’s head. “Yes. Blunt force trauma.”
“Are you a doctor now, Manny?” Vera asks, blasé.
“As a matter of fact—”
“—We can take a trip down memory lane later,” I interrupt. “Somebody left him here for a reason.”
“So we could find him,” Andrew states. “It’s meant to scare us.”
“Well…” I look around. “Are we scared?”