Page 124 of Hot Shot

Every single minute of their pain is torture. The impulse to do something, fix something, is so overwhelming, it’s a living thing in my chest, scratching and clawing to get out. But all I can do is lie here in the dark and try to get some rest.

I roll over again and punch my pillow, sighing at my new view of the cinderblock wall, wondering if I’m going to sleep at all.

When every light in the station flips on, I know the answer is no.

Dispatch comes over the speakers, and I’m out of bed before everyone, heading for the bay. The guys stumble behind me as we get the details for the fire, doing our best to listen, half awake and hurrying into our gear. Tate hisses a swear whenhe’s buckling his jacket and realizes he forgot to pull up his suspenders. I’m too tired to even fuck with him about it.

Brady is already climbing into the driver’s seat of the engine, and the rest of us pile in. Tate brings up the rear with half his shit in his hands. The second his ass hits his jump seat, we’re rolling, sirens blaring. As we tear through town, I’m busy getting my gear in order, listening to the call, thankful the Chief is on his way and can run command so I don’t have to. Like just about everything in Roseville, the house is less than five minutes away—by the time we reach it, I’m buzzing.

Chief Anderson is getting out of his Suburban when we pull up to the two-story house and spill out. I stride to meet him, my eyes scanning and brain clicking through a plan. Flames lick through the front left windows of the house, but given the amount of black smoke billowing from the second floor windows, I’m almost positive that’s not where the fire started. If it had, there would be more.

Chief’s gray brows are knitted together, and he’s scanning too, radio in hand. We forego greetings, heading to the left side of the house in thick smoke while we plan. The wind is steady and heavy in our direction, dead set to blanket us.

He nods when we’re able to see again—the back left corner of the house is raging.

Briskly, we walk back to the engine and solidify the plan. We’ll go in through the front door, knock out the fire in the front left, then make our way to the back where I have a feeling it started. We’ll knock out whatever we find, and once we’ve got it down, search and rescue.

Don’t be so sure of yourself. You never know what you’re going to find.

When we part ways at the engine, he’s on his radio with dispatch, his voice accompanying me from the radio on my coat.

Brady is busy with the pump, but Tate and Jake have already pulled the crosslay, the hose sitting in its neatly folded stack in the grass. It’s a flurry of motion and clipped orders, our masks on early for the heavy smoke—we have maybe twenty minutes before we’ll need air. Plenty of time. I pull on my gloves and grab my pickaxe, the open nozzle in Tate’s hands gurgling and popping as air and water rush through. My pulse thumps in my neck and ears, the heat a physical thing, hitting me like a wall as I approach the front door. The roar of the fire is all I can hear when I glance over my shoulder at Tate and get a thumbs up.

I grip my axe and turn to the door.

Time is a funny thing when you’re in danger, your brain pumping adrenaline like a steam engine in an effort to keep you alive. Things happen in bursts, clipped and shuttering. Or time stands still, hanging suspended in an everlasting moment. Nothing means anything outside of what’s in front of you, your single-minded focus the only thing keeping you on this side of the line between life and death.

It’s in flashes that I watch myself turn my axe head down. I feel the reverberation up my arms when the head slams into the door just above the deadbolt. My body is coiled, anticipating the second it breaks—it’s an explosive game of jack-in-the-box I’m playing when I bash the door again.

With the third, the door flies toward me, propelled by the pressure inside, slamming against the side of the house. A wall of smoke rushes from the doorway, strong, hot, destructive. but I’ve already dropped to the ground, the eruption of heat pouring over me. In a breath, it’s a torrent. In another, it’s a river. Which is when Tate and Jake join me, waiting on my signal to head in.

When we do, we’re plunged into darkness.

The flashlights on our straps only cut a few feet into the murky smoke as Tate leads us into the house on our hands and knees, hauling the stiff hose with Jake sandwiched between us.Instantly, I feel the heat on my neck where my hood isn’t tucked in and adjust it as we hug the wall to the left. First we hit a small bathroom, then a stairwell, until we find a wall on the left to follow. I have no idea if we’re in a room or a hallway, only that we need to go left as soon as we hit an entry. But fifteen feet into the house, and all we’ve done is weave around a recliner and a dresser standing haphazardly in our path.

I see the faint glow ahead and stop when Jake does. I can’t see Tate but for the occasional flash of reflective material until he leans toward Jake, yelling something. Jake nods and turns to me, bringing his mask close.

“There’s couches or somethin’ piled up, Cap!”

I nod, and we shuffle over to the pile of furniture barricading the entrance.

“What the fuck?” I say to nobody, inspecting the cased opening into the room. The glow of the fire is brighter between the stack of bullshit, the temperature leaping as we work on it. It takes what feels like forever to dislodge the top couch, sending it toppling into the room beyond, and a fresh wave of hot air slams into us when it’s gone. The second goes easier, and the third we get out of the way with a solid shove. We’re back on our hands and knees and surging into the room, the fire flashing and bellowing from the depths of dark smoke. Furniture litters the room, and we wind around a wardrobe, close to reaching our destination.

The creak doesn’t register until Jake sinks, toppling to the right. All three of us are yelling and confused, Jake wild eyed and scrabbling away from the leaning floor. I don’t understand what he’s saying until he points at his leg, punched through the floor up to his balls.

I grab him and pull with Tate, trying to dislodge him, but the hole isn’t much bigger than his leg. It seems like it takes too long to pull him out, the fire closer, hotter—all three of our air packalarms are going off, clicking like little jackhammers as we huff and pant. Beyond the towering wardrobe, we have a view of the fire raging along what looks like the entire side of the house. Tate rises up to his knees with the hose and Jake braces him with a hand on his back. When he eases open the nozzle to full force, it pushes him back, despite putting all his weight into it. Jake and I wrangle the hose behind him, advancing toward the flames.

Seconds, and the fire is knocked down. I grab Tate’s right arm and pull him toward the back of the house before giving him a little shove to get going. The smoke is still muddy and dark as we crawl toward the back, met with the heart of the fire, raging in the kitchen.

The walls are black and eaten through, the glow of flames crawling across the ceiling toward us. Tate rises again, the front of him lit white-hot as a cabinet falls off close by with a crash, sending sparks and embers out in a cloud. In answer, he opens the nozzle, aiming the torrent of water at the roots of the flaming beast.

It always amazes me how unstoppable a hungry, vicious fire feels. How dangerous and deadly it is up to the very second we find it. Because once we do, it’s dead in a matter of heartbeats.

Tate whoops when it’s knocked down, closing the nozzle. But down the hall to my right, the glow flickers through the dense smoke. Again, I’m yelling orders as I grab Tate’s arm, pulling him by the coat and pointing, since I’m sure he can’t hear me. He nods when he sees it.

I clock the clicking air pack alarm and glance at my gauge with a moment of shock. There’s less than I thought. Not enough to knock out whatever’s down that hallway. I’ve gotta get Jake and?—

Time stretches and snaps to the sound of a splintering, groaning roar, and when I look up, the ceiling splits, burstingopen to an explosion of wood and plaster and piping, raining down on us like hellfire.

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