Hot Water
We were all in Matt’s apartment when the warning hit.
It came through every screen at once. The television, our phones, even the old tablet Matt used as a clock. There was no buildup, no explanation, just white text against a black background.
BRACE FOR INCOMING GEOLOGICAL EVENT
None of us had time to ask what that meant. Seconds later, a shockwave struck the building, throwing it sideways as though something massive had punched the city itself. Windows exploded inward, and the floor buckled beneath our feet. Somewhere below us, something detonated with a sound so deep I felt it in my teeth.
The screams followed almost immediately, dozens of voices overlapping through the concrete and shattered glass. Julie went down when a bookshelf toppled onto her. I heard the crack before I saw her leg pinned beneath the splintered wood. She didn’t scream at first, merely sucked in a breath and went pale.
Matt reacted before either of us could move. He shoved the shelf aside, ignoring the blood running down his hands, and lifted Julie into his arms.
“We’re leaving,” he said. “Now.”
Another alert interrupted the chaos, flashing across the screens that had somehow survived the impact.
MOVE TO DESIGNATED EVACUATION POINTS. DO NOT STOP.
BY 14:00 HOURS THE ENTIRE AREA WILL BE SANITIZED.
Sanitized. None of us said anything, but I suspected we had all reached the same conclusion about what that meant.
We joined the crowd pouring down the stairwell. People were bleeding, carrying children, or dragging whatever possessions they had managed to grab. Dust and smoke filled the air, burning my lungs, while smaller tremors continued to shake the building. Each one sent another wave of panic through the crowd.
Outside, the destruction was even worse. The street had split open in several places, with sections of asphalt folded over themselves. Fires burned along ruptured gas lines, and sirens wailed in the distance until they abruptly fell silent. Somewhere to the east, something enormous collapsed with a noise that seemed to roll across the entire city.
Matt kept moving, carrying Julie through the wreckage. Her injured leg hung at an unnatural angle, swelling rapidly, and blood had begun soaking into his shirt. Every time he adjusted his grip, she cried out in pain. People reached toward us, begging for help, but Matt pushed past them without slowing.
I couldn’t bring myself to do the same. I helped pull a man out from beneath a car door and dragged a woman away from a live electrical wire that was sparking across the pavement. Both times, Matt shouted for me to keep up.
The designated evacuation point was a stadium near the waterfront. Helicopters were landing on temporary pads, collecting as many people as possible before lifting off into the smoke-filled sky. We could see them long before we reached the perimeter, and for a few minutes I allowed myself to believe we might actually get out.
By then, the water had already reached the lower city.
Entire streets had become canals filled with debris and bodies. Beyond the flooded buildings, the ocean behaved in ways I had never seen. Its surface heaved and bulged, then withdrew unnaturally far from the shoreline, exposing stretches of seabed that should have remained submerged.
I couldn’t explain what I was seeing, but something was coming with that water.
We reached the stadium perimeter just as another helicopter lifted off. People pressed against the barriers, shouting and waving at the soldiers directing the evacuation. We waited for the next aircraft, watching the smoke above the city, but none appeared.
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An officer screamed something into his radio before throwing it onto the ground.
“That’s it! No more lift! Get back — get back!”
The crowd surged forward anyway. Matt forced his way through, still carrying Julie, shouting at anyone who tried to stop him. I followed as closely as I could until someone struck me from the side and sent me sprawling onto the broken concrete.
Several hands seized my clothes. At first I thought someone was trying to help me up, but they were pulling me backward, trying to drag me beneath the crowd. I struggled to get my feet under me and shouted for Matt.
He didn’t turn around.
I screamed his name again, watching him push farther away with Julie in his arms. He must have heard me, but he never looked back. I understood then that he had already made his choice. Julie was all that mattered to him, and I had become expendable.
I managed to tear myself free, leaving skin and part of my shirt in someone’s grip. By the time I stumbled upright, the sky had begun to ignite.
Firebombs were falling across the city in orderly lines. There was nothing random about the pattern. Entire blocks disappeared behind walls of flame as the bombardment advanced toward the waterfront. The heat reached us almost immediately, growing so intense that every breath seemed to burn.
Then I heard the water behind us.
The ocean was rising, but it wasn’t an ordinary wave. It was an immense wall of dark water, towering above the buildings as it rushed inland. Within it, countless shapes churned and struggled against one another. I couldn’t make out what they were, only that they moved in ways that had nothing to do with the current.
Some were already ahead of the flood. I saw things crawling across rooftops, their limbs moving too quickly and at angles I couldn’t understand. They descended upon people trapped above the rising water, dragging them out of sight before the wave could reach them.
Matt had finally stopped. I found him standing a short distance ahead, looking from the approaching fire to the water behind us. Julie was barely conscious in his arms, her head resting against his shoulder. He looked around once more, searching for a route through the destruction, but there was nowhere left to go.
He lowered Julie gently to the ground and knelt beside her. I stood a few steps away, shaking, watching the city burn and drown at the same time.
“Bill,” he said.
It was the first time he had looked directly at me since the crowd separated us. His expression was empty, exhausted beyond anything I had ever seen.
“I’m sorry.”
I believed him. It didn’t change what he had done, and there was no time left to discuss it.
The firestorm was advancing rapidly, turning the air unbearably hot. Behind us, the screams of those caught by the creatures were disappearing one by one, replaced by the sound of rushing water and something wet and churning beneath it.
Matt wrapped his arms around Julie, shielding her as best he could. I moved closer and remained beside them, facing the approaching flames.
When the fire finally reached us, I closed my eyes.
Some deaths are faster than others.
We chose the fast one.
