Cap, Mike and Roy were lucky. They had wives and families to go home to when things went wrong. People to comfort and renew them. Chet, too, had family. He would go home to stay with his parents, or visit his siblings or cousins. Johnny, well… Johnny would do what he always did… he would go camping, or date one of the many lovely ladies he kept track of for the occasions he was feeling down. Sometimes he would visit with family, but often, the worse the call, the more he would turn to nature, to his roots.
But Marco was totally alone. No one knew it, but ever since the fist fight last fall with his older brother, at his grandmother's birthday party, when too much alcohol and too many angry words had been exchanged; shame and pain had caused Marco to pull away from the one thing that meant more than anything in the world to him…his family. He had left the party, bloodied and drunk, with his abuelo's* words ringing in his ears: "¿Cómo atreve usted insultar su familia luchando en el día especial de su abuela? ¿No eres un hombre? ¡Vete! Usted no es bienvenidos aquí!"** The fact that the fight had been started by his brother meant nothing to Marco. The pain of his grandfather's words had wounded him deeply, because he knew they were true.
He was careful never to show its cause around his shift-mates, but he was not blind to the fact they did notice something was wrong. Gone were his easy grin and joking ways. He rarely smiled anymore, and he had grown nearly as quiet as "Stoic Mike" Stoker. They were all worried about him, but no one knew what was wrong, or how to approach him. Several times, his partner, Chet Kelly tried, but was gently and sadly rebuffed, when Lopez made it clear the topic was off-limits. Even Cap had learned to steer clear of whatever was bothering his senior lineman, and had decided to just let time heal the problem.
~51~
Everyone was feeling a bit off balance, because early in the shift, Cap had cut his hand badly during a run and it had taken fifteen stitches to close the wound. Although he had protested, Dr. Morton had insisted he go off shift. Because of the recent retirement of a couple of captains, and one promotion of another captain, Chief McConnike simply had Mike Stoker take over the shift as Captain for the duration. He had proven more than capable time and time again, and no one had any doubts he would do so again. Mike promoted Marco up to Engineer for the shift, although they would share the duty if the senior lineman was needed at any point. Marco had been studying for the position for a while and was considering promoting up within the next couple of years.
A probie had been sent in to work with Chet Kelly, as he was considered one of the best linemen around. He might be junior to Marco, but that was only because Marco had seniority on him and was older. Chet was a natural teacher, who enjoyed sharing his knowledge, and was able to make others comfortable quickly. He was surprisingly patient with their mistakes, and though he didn't seem to realize it himself, was highly respected for these skills within the department. He had never caught on to how many times a probie lineman had been sent to him for polishing, and how many times that probie had gone on to become one of the finest lineman in the department. Certain folks in the administration, (as well as his captain and his partner) had realized it long ago, and had been wondering how they could possibly talk Chet into becoming a trainer. They knew, however, that, short of retirement, nothing would ever take the lineman away from the work he loved the best. They would just have to be happy with his part-time expertise. (This suited his captain and his partner just fine, thank you!)
His protégé this time was a very young trainee who had been fast-tracked through the Academy. He had graduated at the top of his class, but had still been well-liked by his older class-mates. He was a Legacy firefighter—three generations on either side of his family, plus graduation from high school at 16, his Fire Science degree at 17, and Academy Graduation at 18. Only one other kid in the history of the Department had pretty much pulled off what Dunlop had, though even younger, and he had had to lie in order to do it. But that was another story… Kelly smiled when he thought about that. ***
His thoughts switched rapidly back to Dunlop. The kid was assigned over at 88's, but then, when Stoker took over the shift, Kelly became Senior Lineman and Rick Dunlop became junior to him for the shift. This was okay. The kid's scores were great, and he seemed like a good kid. Hopefully, he would be steady, and keep his head when it counted. When things got real, and the shit hit the fan, that's when you knew if you had the stuff to make it….Little did Chet know they would find out that very day; the day one ten-floor office building combined with one complete maniac turned everyone's life into a living hell.
They had known it was going to be very big and very bad when they first heard the number of companies that were called out on the first tones. It was for four stations and two battalions to assist the city fire department with an engulfed downtown office building. This was extremely unusual, because normally, those fires didn't get too far out of control, because the designers were careful about building in good fire safety measures. Unless the builders didn't follow the designs, which happened more than the fire inspectors would like. None of that mattered right now. What mattered was once again slaying the dragon before it could destroy innocents. The men of 51-A all felt the familiar adrenaline rush as they raced to the scene. None of them knew that not all of them would be coming back to the safety of the stationhouse after this run. The beast would be claiming her price, and it would be a high price indeed.
~TBC~
A/N: The longer Spanish sentences are translated in International Spanish, through Microsoft Translator. My Spanish is fairly limited, and folks would probably be insulted if I attempted translation myself. ;-)
Also, if some of the story seems familiar, just a reminder, this is an expansion of my short-short story "Sometimes the Dragon Wins" from my series "The Dragonslayers of Station 51." I did use that story directly as a part of this one. I couldn't figure any better way to write the scene.
*abuelo's—grandfather's
** "¿Cómo atreve usted insultar su familia luchando en el día especial de su abuela? ¿No eres un hombre? ¡Vete! Usted no es bienvenidos aquí!"—"How dare you insult your family by fighting on your grandmother's special day? Are you not a man? Go away! You are not welcome here!"
*** See Dianne's "Time to Stop Running." I have adopted her ideas about Johnny's age, with her permission.
