The apartment was a shoebox barely fit for living—four stained walls and a cracked window that overlooked a graffiti-scrawled alley. It was the kind of place where sunlight felt like an intruder. The single overhead bulb buzzed faintly, casting a weak, flickering glow over the room. Paint peeled from the ceiling like old scabs, and the air hung heavy with the scent of sweat, mildew, and stale cigarette smoke.
There were no photos, no keepsakes—nothing that hinted at who lived there. Just a low, sunken couch with broken springs and a cracked coffee table littered with empty liquor bottles and crumpled takeout containers, the logos long faded by grease.
Outside the dirty window, New York City pressed in—loud, restless, and indifferent. The alley below was slick with rain and strewn with trash bags that leaked unknown filth. Neon signs flickered against wet brick walls, casting red and blue glows like blood pulsing through veins that never rested, painting the apartment's shadows with uneasy movement.. Sirens howled in the distance, joined by the occasional shout or honk of a taxi in gridlock. Above it all, the skyline loomed like jagged teeth, a glittering contrast to the rot and grime below.
It wasn't home. It was a place to exist. The apartment wasn't a refuge. It was just a buffer zone between the world outside and whatever was left inside the woman who lived there.
Ricky jolted awake, her heart hammering violently against her ribs like a relentless drumbeat. Sweat soaked her skin, and the tangled sheets clung to her like a heavy shroud. The nightmare had struck again—the same merciless vision that haunted her every restless night. She was back in that convoy, the ground shaking beneath her as the explosion ripped through the air, tearing her world apart. Warner, her closest friend, was gone—his laughter forever silenced, swallowed by the chaos.
Almost a ritual after waking, she reached blindly for the burner phone on the counter. The metal was warm, almost sticky in the humidity of the apartment—like everything else in this rat hole: grimy, lived-in, and edged with the stench of old sweat, takeout grease, and the faint bite of industrial cleaner she barely remembered using. She hit play on the voicemail without checking the number.
Then she turned to the punching bag in the corner. As she pummeled the bag, sweat already beading on her forehead and dripping down the curve of her spine, the tinny voice from the phone filled the room, cutting through the damp air like a blade.
The first voice crackled through the speaker, thin and nasal:
"Ricky, it's your landlord again. Rent was due the first. It's the twelfth. You're two months behind now. I can't keep giving you breaks—one more week and I'm changing the locks."
She wiped her knuckles on her tank top, leaving a smear of blood and sweat. The bag swayed gently, creaking on its chain. She punched it again. Hard.
"This call is for Erica Smith. This is a message from Stone Ridge Collections. You have an outstanding balance of $14,892.67. Failure to respond will result in legal action."
Erica. No one called her that anymore. The name felt foreign, like it belonged to someone else—a softer version of her that didn't exist now. That woman was dead, buried with the last piece of her soul in the desert sands.
"Ricky, it's Jake. Heard you're taking on cases again. I got something for you. It's messy, sleazy, and might get you shot—but it pays well. Let me know if you're still breathing."
A chuckle followed, low and dry, as if even he wasn't sure she'd answer.
She stopped punching long enough to flex her aching hands, the skin raw where calluses had split open. She could feel her pulse hammering in her wrists, the faint metallic taste of adrenaline rising in her mouth.
Then came the ones that twisted the knife.
"Ricky. It's Tommy. You owe me five grand. And that was last month. With interest, it's seven now. You know I don't like chasing people. Don't make me come looking."
Her throat tightened. The bag got another brutal right hook.
"Hey, bitch. It's Marco. You think you can disappear? We haven't forgotten what you pulled. We're coming for you. Sooner than you think."
Her breath hitched. She imagined Marco's voice not coming from the speaker, but from the hallway outside, a knife in hand, a grin on his face. Let him come, she had faced worse.
The phone fell silent. Static hummed for a moment, then nothing.
She wiped her face with the back of her arm, sweat stinging her eyes, and turned back to the bag. Her next punch split her knuckle. She welcomed the pain.
❧
Two Years Ago – The Cage, East End Warehouse, 1:23 a.m.
The warehouse was a pressure cooker—thick with sweat, cheap beer, and rotted ambition. Bodies pressed shoulder to shoulder, howling and banging fists on the chain-link fencing around the cage. Inside, under flickering industrial lights, Ricky stood still as stone, her breath calm, her eyes locked on her opponent.
Her opponent was a mountain of muscle and bravado—Tank Moreno, a local favorite with more bark than bite. He stalked the cage like a rabid pit bull, snarling, throwing warm-up jabs into the air like they meant something. Ricky didn't flinch. She didn't need to. She'd read his footwork ten seconds into warm-up. He was slow on the pivot. Too confident in his right hook. The kind of fighter who'd never had to earn it the hard way.
The bell clanged, raw and metallic.
They collided like tectonic plates, fists flying, the crowd roaring with every blow.
Tank lunged in with a wild overhand punch. Ricky ducked low and slammed a hook into his ribs—felt cartilage shift beneath her knuckles. He grunted, stumbling, but she backed off. Slower. Sloppy. That wasn't the fight she would've given any other night.
The next round, she danced around him, taking a few hits that barely clipped her—she sold it anyway. Gritting her teeth, letting her body sag with just enough weight to fool the eyes watching. Tank took the bait, charging forward. She let him push her into the cage, absorbed the hits with practiced grace, and dropped her guard just enough.
She could've ended it. One left jab to disorient him, a knee to the liver, and he'd be down. She knew it. Her body itched to do it. Muscle memory burned to finish the fight.
But she didn't.
They clashed in a blur of movement—Tank roaring like an animal, throwing bombs. Ricky slipped under his punches like smoke, landing a clean jab to the ribs, then a sharp elbow that staggered him. His breath wheezed out between gritted teeth.
She could feel it—his balance shifting, guard wide open.
One more hit.
Just one—
Boom.
The sound didn't come from the cage.
It came from the past.
The air around her warped. The roar of the crowd dissolved. The flashing lights overhead turned to searing sunlight. Her knees buckled.
She was in the desert again.
Sand in her teeth. Blood on her hands. The smell—burning rubber, diesel fuel, scorched flesh. Gunfire in the distance. And Warner's voice—
"Ricky, get down—!"
She flinched. Just a blink. Just a second.
But it was enough.
Tank's fist connected with her cheekbone, and the world cracked sideways. She hit the mat hard, jaw rattling. Her ears rang like they had that day. The ref's voice shouted something she couldn't hear. Boots stomped around her, the cage spun overhead, a blur of steel and fire.
She didn't get up.
The match was called. The crowd screamed. Tank raised his arms and roared like he'd done something worth cheering. Ricky lay still, staring at the ceiling, heart pounding like it was trying to escape her ribs.
Backstage, after the blood had dried and the adrenaline wore off, Vinny Delmonte waited, all slick grin and stink of cigarettes.
"You made it look good," he said, holding out a thick envelope. "Like you meant it."
Ricky took the cash with hands that still trembled. Not from the fight. From memory.
Vinny winked. "Don't worry, sweetheart. Nobody questions why a fighter like you throws a match. They just assume you're desperate."
She gave him a tired smirk, masking the storm inside.
"Then they're right," she said. "Desperation's expensive."
He laughed and walked off, pleased.
Ricky leaned against the cold concrete wall, the envelope heavy in her hand. She let the lie stand. Let them think it was the money. That she sold out.
Because the truth—that she froze, that her mind broke for a heartbeat and dragged her back to a battlefield she never left—was too raw. Too real.
❧
Warner Thompson hadn't just been her friend. He was her anchor in a world that never stopped shifting. He'd had that kind of laugh that made you want to laugh too—even in the middle of the worst days. It had been reckless and stupid and bright, like he refused to let the darkness swallow him. And for a while, she had believed that if she stuck close enough to him, maybe it wouldn't swallow her either.
They'd met in basic training, where he showed up with that cocky grin and expensive boots that screamed "rich kid slumming it." She hated him at first—too clean, too charming, too sure of himself. But the bastard earned her respect faster than she expected. He had her back in every fight, every march, every goddamn thing that broke other people. He made her laugh when her ribs ached and pulled her out of foxholes with gunfire cracking around them like the sky was coming apart.
Then came the convoy.
It had been routine—"safe," they said. Just transport. Just another checkpoint. But they never saw the second IED. She remembered Warner shouting, trying to pull her to safety. The heat, the light, the explosion—then nothing but ringing in her ears and the taste of dirt and copper in her mouth. When she came to, he was gone.
That's when the dreams started.
Not the cinematic ones with tidy flashbacks. Hers came in flashes. Sudden light. Screams. The smell of burning rubber and blood. Warner's voice, shouting her name from somewhere she couldn't reach. Every time she closed her eyes, it was like falling back into that moment—helpless, deaf, covered in blood that wasn't hers.
After the funeral, people offered their apologies. His parents didn't meet her eyes. She understood—they hadn't been able to recover his body, his parents buried an empty casket. That was unforgivable.
She stopped answering calls after that. Stopped returning messages. She ghosted everyone—family, friends, even her old commanding officer who had tried to check in. She couldn't explain it. The feeling of standing in the grocery store and suddenly smelling diesel fuel, or the way fireworks in July made her dive for cover like the war was still going on right here, in this broken city.
PTSD wasn't just something in her head—it was a parasite. It crawled into her chest and nested there, whispering that she didn't deserve peace. That if Warner was gone, she had no right to be here either.
But she kept breathing. Barely.
And over time, she found ways to fight the silence. Underground fights where pain felt like proof she was still alive. Booze that burned like memory. Cases that dragged her into the shadows of other people's lives, so she didn't have to face her own.
She told herself it was survival.
But deep down, she knew—it was punishment.
Ricky's tears welled up unexpectedly as memories from the past crashed over her, and she let out a final, weary punch on the battered punching bag. The dull thud echoed in the quiet room. Suddenly, a faint rustling noise near the window caught her attention. Her muscles tensed as she moved cautiously toward the sound, every step careful and deliberate, bracing for anything. But when she peered out, it was only the neighbor's cat, its curious eyes glinting in the dim light. Relief washed over Ricky, and she let a long, shaky breath escape her lips, though her heart still hammered in her chest. She reached out for her pack of cigarettes, hoping for some comfort, only to realize with a sinking feeling that she was completely out.
Ricky stepped out of her apartment and headed down the street to the bodega. Somewhere in the distance, the faint wail of police sirens cut through the night air—that was New York for you, always alive, always restless. As she pushed open the door, she paused to scratch behind Betty the Bulldog's ears. The old dog was sprawled near the entrance, her drool-drenched jowls and slow blinks making her look less like a living creature and more like some grim taxidermy exhibit stuck in time.
"It's 4 a.m., Ricky. Don't you ever sleep?" Sal called from behind the counter. Short and pudgy, with a face that could scare off most street punks, Sal was more like a gruff father figure to those who knew him.
Ricky grabbed a six-pack of cheap beer and set it on the counter. "Who else is gonna keep you company, Sal?"
"You don't need to worry about me. Betty's got me covered," Sal said with a chuckle. "It's you who needs company. Why don't you meet someone? Settle down for a change?"
"Not interested," Ricky replied, eyeing the magazines by the counter. "Pack of American Spirits too, please." Sal fetched a step ladder to reach the cigarettes displayed high above.
Before she could react, the sharp scent of chewing tobacco hit her, followed instantly by the cold feel of a gun pressed to the back of her head. She caught her attacker's reflection in the shiny lenses of sunglasses Sal had on display. Without hesitation, Ricky dropped to her knees, drove an elbow into his crotch, grabbed the arm holding the gun, and flipped him around, slamming his face hard onto the tile floor. The man went out cold.
"Now Sal," she said, catching her breath, "if I hadn't been up this late, who would've taken care of this trash for you?" She handed the gun to Sal along with twelve dollars for her purchase. Shaking his head, Sal slipped the weapon under the counter and dialed the police.
Outside again, Ricky lit a cigarette with a flick of her fingers, the flame briefly illuminating the hard lines of her face. The smoke curled into the night air, acrid and familiar, grounding her like it always did after one of those long, echoing days. Her boots scuffed softly against the cracked concrete stairs as she climbed back toward her apartment. The old building creaked in protest with each step, its chipped paint and rusted railings whispering of a thousand forgotten lives.
As she rounded the corner to her door, the glow of the hallway bulb flickered—then she saw him.
A man hunched in front of her unit. Hood up. Face masked. His gloved hands worked quickly at her lock, metal tools glinting faintly. She froze—not from fear, but calculation. The flutter in her chest flared for half a breath before converting into something colder, harder. Adrenaline surged through her veins like an old friend.
She'd been through worse. Hell, she'd done worse.
Ricky dropped the cigarette, grinding it out under her boot without a sound. Her breath came slow and controlled as she stepped forward like a ghost, each footfall measured, silent. The scent of oil and gunmetal clung faintly to the intruder, unmistakable to someone like her. That smell had once been her world.
She waited.
Let him commit. Let him think he's won.
The lock clicked.
That was the last thing he got to do.
She lunged, all muscle and precision. Years of close-quarters combat training kicked in. She slammed into him, shoulder first, and they crashed through the door, splintering it open. The apartment exploded with noise—metal striking wood, both their grunts echoing through the empty space.
He hit the ground hard, and she was on him in an instant, knees pinning his arms, her knife drawn and pressed to the vulnerable space beneath his jawline. The steel bit cold into his skin.
"Wrong apartment," she hissed, voice low and dangerous. "You should've picked a softer target."
For a moment, the only sounds were their heavy breathing and the distant hum of city noise beyond the broken door.
"I wasn't gonna rob you," the man insisted.
Ricky's eyes narrowed. The voice—she knew it. Despite her disbelief, it couldn't be. Heart pounding, hands steady, she demanded, "Who are you?"
Slowly, he peeled off the mask. Ricky staggered back, shock washing over her. Warner was alive.