Page 13 of Passions Ignite

Zoey stretched her hand toward Marcia but she simply nodded curtly at her, ignoring her hand.

“She didn’t mean any insult,” Lux whispered to her. “That’s just Marcia.”

“Oh,” Zoey said.

“We’ve got a lot to cover today. First, I want to talk about the state of our station and where we stand in terms of resources.”

Becky clicked a button on the projector remote, bringing up a slide that showed a list of their current assets: trucks, equipment, helicopters, and personnel.

Zoey leaned forward slightly, taking it all in. The numbers weren’t great, but they were about what she had expected. The station was under-resourced, like most of the others she’d worked at.

“We’ve got a total of three helicopters,” Chief Thompson continued. “Two are fitted with the necessary gear for fighting fires. Water tanks, thermal imaging, the works. The third is still waiting on some repairs and upgrades, so it’s not fully operational yet.”

She turned to Marcia. “How soon can we get the third chopper operational?”

Marcia shrugged. “A week? Maybe two?”

“That’s not ideal,” Chief Thompson said.

“My team is working on getting that third chopper up to standard as soon as possible,” Marcia added.

“Get it done. In the meantime, we’ll have to make do with what we’ve got.”

She paused, giving everyone a moment to digest the information before moving on.

“In terms of personnel, we’re stretched thin, as usual. We’ve got a solid ground team, but we’re short on pilots. Lux, as chief pilot, is doing the best she can with what we have, but it’s going to be tough.”

She clicked to bring up the next slide, which showed a map of the region with several areas highlighted in red.

“These are the possible hotspots we’re most concerned about,” she said, pointing to the map. “There’s a big one to the north, near the edge of town, and another out to the west, near the forest. If the winds shift, we could be looking at a pretty serious situation.”

Zoey felt a knot of anxiety tighten in her stomach. She’d seen too many situations like this before—understaffed, under-resourced, and on the brink of disaster.

“We’ll need to prioritize our response,” Chief Thompson said. “We can’t be everywhere at once, so we need to be smart about where we deploy our resources.”

Lux leaned forward, her eyes on the map. “Chief, if I may,” she began, “I think we need to focus our efforts on tackling the fires at the hotspots. We’ve got two choppers that are fully equipped, and I can take one of them to the northern area while the other handles the west. If we concentrate our ground teams there as well, we can hit the fires hard and hopefully contain them before they spread.”

Zoey’s eyes narrowed slightly as she listened to Lux’s suggestion. It was a solid plan, tactically speaking, but there was something about it that didn’t sit right with her.

“We can’t ignore the evacuation and rescue operations,” Zoey said. “There are still people in those areas, and if we focus all our efforts on the fires, we’re leaving them at risk.”

Lux turned to Zoey, a snarl forming. “We’re firefighters, Lieutenant Knight. Our primary job is to put out the fires. If we don’t, there won’t be anyone left to rescue.”

“I beg to differ, Chief Valentine. Our primary objective is to ensure the security of lives and property by putting out fires.”

“And when the fires intensify?” Lux’s face was defiant and her shoulders tense as hell. She looked ready to fight. Zoey kept calm.

“I understand,” she said. “But I’ve seen what happens when a team is too focused on fighting the fires and not enough on getting people out. We can’t afford to make that mistake.”

“And how do you suggest we do that?” Lux asked. “Expend all our resources on rescue operations?”

“We don’t need to expend. We prioritize evacuation and rescue operations,” Zoey said. “We can assign a few teams to tackle the fires, but the majority of our efforts should be on getting people out of harm’s way. Land attacks in these areas could be dangerous, especially if the winds shift.”

Lux’s expression didn’t change, but Zoey could see the stubbornness in her eyes. “And what happens if the fires spread faster because we’re too focused on evacuation? We could end up with an even bigger disaster on our hands.”

Zoey felt her frustration growing, but she kept it in check. “I’m not saying we ignore the fires, Lux,” she said. “But we have to be smart about this. If we lose people because we didn’t get them out in time, that’s on us.”

Chief Thompson cleared her throat, interrupting their argument. “Alright, let’s take a step back here, you two,” she said, her tone calm but firm. “Both of you make valid points, but we need to find a balance. We can’t afford to ignore either the fires or the people in those areas.”

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