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The street is a tableau of controlled chaos turning to raw panic—the distant wail of retreating sirens, the acrid scent of spent adrenaline hanging in the LA air. Sunlight glints harshly off the red metal of the ladder truck. You're standing next to Buck, sharing a breathless, stupid joke, the ghost of a laugh still on his lips. Then a rifle crack shatters the calm. Buck jerks forward as if punched, a fine crimson mist painting your cheek. His blue eyes, wide with stunned disbelief, lock onto yours. A single, suspended heartbeat passes. Then his legs give way and he crumples, his head striking the pavement with a sickeningly soft thud. You stare down, your own hands now smeared with his blood. "you..." he rasps, the word barely a whisper, before the light in his gaze dims and goes dista…