Page 172 of Controlled Burn
“Red flag warning. Multi-story fire. Confirmed children inside.”
A map blinked to life on the monitor. Downtown. A four-story hotel. Mid-renovation. Partially occupied. Partially condemned. Wind gusts were hitting forty miles per hour.
She ran for Ladder 12. Brooks climbed into the cab across from her, jaw tight, eyes cold.
Good. Let him sweat.
McKenna’s voice came sharp over the headset. “This is it. Watch him. Don’t lose sight.”
Talia’s hands trembled just once as she clipped her gear. Last night, she’d crept into Dean’s bed like it was hers to take. If a call had dropped while she was curled against him… If someone had walked in… The shame was still thick in her throat. But the fire was thicker.
Ten minutes later, they arrived at chaos. Smoke poured from the top floors, thick and black, whipped sideways by the wind. Civilians screamed behind barricades. Windows burst in the heat. From somewhere above—shrieks. Small. High-pitched.
Kids.
“Interior search!” Talia shouted. “Watts, Delaney—you’re with me. Brent, Elijah, and Brooks—fire attack on Bravo side. Stay on the radio.”
She looked Brooks dead in the eye. He hesitated. Then nodded.
But her gut twisted.
Inside, the world changed.
Heat slammed into her, pressed her flat. The mask bit into her skin, and sweat pooled beneath the seal. All she could taste was recycled plastic, every breath hissing wetly through the regulator. Each inhale, a mechanical whine. Each exhale, a metallic rasp echoing inside her helmet.
Her senses shrank. She couldn’t smell the burning building—just the dry taste of her air, the squeal of PASS alarms, the groan of failing beams, and the hammer of her pulse in her throat.
Delaney’s voice crackled in her ear, high but steady, rookie fear threading through the static.
“Check under every bed, behind every door!” Talia barked, her words thin and metallic.
They found the first child under a desk, curled up and shaking. Delaney scooped the kid into her arms, hands trembling but sure, murmuring reassurance through her mask. Talia barely heard it over the hiss of her regulator and the roar of the fire.
The hallway narrowed. Flame licked the ceiling tiles. Smoke banked low, pressing in from all sides. Watts froze, standing statue-still in the thick gray soup, helmet tipped toward the flames.
Talia snapped, “Watts! Move!” but got nothing.
“I said GO!”
“I—I can’t—” came Watts’s voice, ragged through the radio.
Delaney pushed past with the kid, boots splashing through water pooling underfoot.
Talia’s hands shook as she reached for Watts, voice steel through the mask. “Watts, follow my voice.”
But when she turned—
Brooks was gone.
Not on Bravo. Not on the radio. Not anywhere.
He hadn’t just disappeared. He’d abandoned fire attack while children were inside.
The fire crawled up her boots. She felt the floor vibrating beneath her feet. The hiss of her regulator was her only anchor.
She forced down the old panic.
Stay low. Move forward. No freezing. Don’t lose it now.
