Family Ties that Bind

"Capp's going to be out of service for the rest of shift," Kelly Severide explained to Chief Boden, "his mask failed on the last call and he inhaled a lot of smoke. We got him to Med and the doctors want to keep him overnight for observation."

"How serious is it?" Boden asked.

"I don't know, sounded more like a precaution than anything, I talked to him earlier and he said he was feeling better, but the doctor won't budge on it," Severide said.

"What went wrong with the mask?" Matt Casey asked.

"Found a crack in it once he got it off, but I don't know how it happened," Kelly said.

"Okay, as a precaution on our own side, it wouldn't be a bad idea to check the rest of the masks and make sure there are no more surprises," Boden said. "If Squad would be called out again tonight, can you manage without him or do we need to bring in a replacement?"

Severide shook his head, "I don't know, but I think as late in the shift as it is, we'll be able to manage," Kelly said.

"Maybe not," Connie said as she came up to them with a puzzled look on her face.

"What is it, Connie?" Wallace asked.

"I'm not sure," his assistant answered. "Somebody just called and said they wanted to report a car accident and requested Truck, Squad and Ambo but said to leave the police out of it."

"They called you directly?" Boden asked.

"Yes, Chief, this isn't coming from dispatch," she said. She handed him the message, "Here's the address."

Boden examined the note, as did the two lieutenants.

"This address mean anything to either one of you?" Boden asked his men.

They both shook their heads. "No."

"Go check it out," Boden told them, "if it looks like a setup, call it in."

"Got it, Chief," Casey said as he went to get the others.


"I don't get it," Otis said during the drive to the call, "who calls the fire department directly to report an accident instead of 911?"

"Somebody that don't want cops showing up," Herrmann said, "people trust firefighters before they trust cops."

"What do you think, Lieutenant?" Cruz asked.

Casey had Connie's note and was staring at it.

"Lieutenant?" Cruz repeated.

"How'd they know to ask for Rescue Squad?" Casey questioned.

"Huh?" Otis asked.

"Connie wrote down what the caller said. They said, and I quote 'We need Truck, Squad, and an ambo'. Who talks like that? Who even thinks to ask for Squad after an accident? That's left to the dispatchers to sort out."

"Sounds like a firefighter called it in," Herrmann commented.

"Why wouldn't they call 911 then?"

"Would you?" Herrmann asked. "Something happened, you know Connie's gonna put the word out faster than dispatch can."

"But that only makes sense if it's somebody from 51," Casey said.

"Maybe it's one of the guys from 1st or 2nd Watch," Otis suggested.

"Then they would've identified themselves," Casey pointed out.

"Maybe there wasn't time," Cruz thought. "Need all of us for a car accident, you know it's bad."

"That's something else that bothers me," Casey said. "If it's a multi-car pileup, why didn't they specify that?"

"We'll be there soon, then hopefully we can get some answers," Herrmann told him.

The address turned out to be a part of the city that nobody lived in anymore, it was just empty streets and empty lots that had accumulated all kinds of crap from people who weren't there anymore. But as the trucks pulled up, they saw several people standing around in a frenzy, and as everybody got out, they saw two older cars about 100 feet from each other that had both crashed. Judging by the freak show of spectators, all of them looking late teens to early 20s, who were just standing around gawking, it looked like a street race that was a lose/lose for everyone involved.

"What happened?" Casey asked as they got out of the truck.

A boy with spiked hair and a matching dog collar around his neck, who barely looked old enough to drive himself, pointed to the car on the far left that had gone off the road and hit a tree, "AJ wiped out, he might be dead."

A 4'5" girl with dark brown hair who didn't look older than 10 hollered from the other side of the street, where the other car had gone into a ditch and was on two tires and halfway to turning on its side, "Forget about that bastard, he got what he deserved! Get over here!"

"We're gonna get everybody out, just calm down," Casey told them.

"We'll take this one," Severide told him.

Casey went over to the girl, "What's this guy's name?"

"Huh?" she asked as they walked over to the car.

Casey climbed down the embankment of the ditch, minding his footing, assessed the situation and and saw the driver was still strapped in his seat. The window was down so Casey stuck his head in and saw the driver was wearing a white racing suit with a matching helmet.

"What's his name?" Casey asked the girl again.

"Queenie."

Casey shot her a look but quickly dismissed it. As weird as these kids were dressed, why not?

"Queenie, my name's Matt Casey, can you hear me?" he asked as he reached for the visor on the helmet and lifted it.

The face of a teen girl with blonde hair looked back at him though her eyes didn't appear to actually see him.

"Queenie?"

The girl in the driver's seat blinked, groaned and weakly got out, "Don't ever call me that, my name's McQueen."

In spite of the situation, Casey smirked. "Any relation to the actor?"

She weakly snorted, "I wish."

Casey called orders over to Herrmann and Otis, then took his glove off and asked her, "Can you tell me how many fingers I'm holding up?"

"One."

"Can you follow it?"

"I can see your damn finger," she told him.

"I know that, can you follow it?"

She did. "Now what? You want me to squeeze your hand too to see I'm not paralyzed?"

"Oh you're good," Casey said lightly as he stuck his hand in the window. "You done this before?"

"No, I just know how you people do."

"You happen to call this in?" Casey asked.

"Hell no," the blonde girl answered, "Pixie did."

"Who?"

"The midget girl back there," McQueen moved her eyes to the side instead of nodding her head.

Casey saw she had gloves on that matched her suit. "Mind if I take this off?" he asked.

"Whatever."

He did, and noted, "That's a fancy suit you got, you going into professional racing?"

"No, it's my dad's," she answered.

"Oh, he's a racer?"

"He used to be, before he ruined his life and got married and had kids," the girl told him.

"That a direct quote?" Casey inquired.

"Doesn't have to be, I know it," she said.

Casey had her grip his hand. She did, and squeezed harder than he was expecting.

"Very good," he said, "Alright, McQueen, I hope you're not too attached to this car because we're gonna have to take the door off to get you out."

She snorted and told him, "Fine with me, it ain't mine."

Somehow that didn't surprise him.

"Casey," Severide came over and came down the embankment.

"How's the other guy?" Matt asked, not taking his eyes off what he was doing.

"Up and walking but we called in a second ambo anyway."

"I don't need a damn ambo, just get me out of this car," McQueen told him.

"Oh yeah, Severide, this is McQueen," Casey casually said.

"Okay," Severide was willing to go along with it. He crouched down and told the girl, "You're gonna have to get checked out by the paramedics to make sure there's no spinal injury."

"There's nothing wrong with my spine," she insisted.

"Maybe not," Casey told her, "you were smart, you've held perfectly still, you knew what to do, but now you have to let us do our job, and then let the paramedics do their job."

"I guess I don't have much choice, do I?" she asked as she raised her hand and flipped the visor back down.


Herrmann finished cutting the hinges and Otis and Cruz pulled the door off the car. Casey got the girl's helmet off, got a collar on her neck despite her protests and he and Severide eased her out of the driver's seat and onto a backboard.

"Get me off this damn thing," she tried to writhe around, "I'm fine."

"The paramedics will be the judge of that," Severide said.

"No they won't, I'm refusing medical treatment, that's my right," she insisted.

"Do you have any ID?"

"Yeah, under the suit."

"They'll probably cut that off at the hospital."

"It zips, smartass," she told him.

Kelly pulled off his glove, found the zipper around the waist and separated the jacket from the pants, revealing she had a pair of jean shorts on underneath. Severide fished into her pocket, trying not to move too much, and pulled out a driver's license.

"Queenie McWhorter." Okay, now the alias started to make sense.

Otis came up and looked at the license and told the girl, "Sorry, Miss McWhorter, according to this you're only 17 years old, therefore a minor, and minors can't deny medical treatment."

The girl tried jumping up on the backboard, screaming all sorts of vulgarities at them as she insisted she was 19. Severide took the license from Otis, flashed it to the paramedics and told them, "She's a minor, take her to Med."

"Got it," Brett nodded.

"That's it," Casey told the others, "everybody load up the tools and let's get back to 51."

"Got it, Lieutenant," Herrmann said.

Casey went over to Severide and Otis and took a look at the license and said, "Hey Otis, according to this, that girl is 19."

"Oops, my bad," Brian said with a straight face.

Casey turned to Kelly and asked, "That seem a bit odd to you?"

Severide shrugged, "Last thing anybody wants is cops or parents involved, and a trip to the hospital usually guarantees one of the two. If she were a minor, then it'd be her parents, since she's not, it'll likely be the police."

Their conversation was broken up by Otis' sudden exclamation, "HEY, WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?"

Both lieutenants turned around to see what was going on. Most of the kids had scattered when the second ambulance was called in out of fear the cops would be next, but apparently one of them had stayed behind. The short girl Casey had spoken to earlier had wandered over to the car and pulled something out of the passenger side window and tried to make off with it, then Otis caught her as she climbed up from the ditch. A brief struggle ensued, the girl screamed and kicked and finally broke loose, but Otis kept the bag she'd taken.

"What's that?" Severide asked.

"Looks like a gym bag," Otis said as he took it over to them, "must belong to that girl they just took out."

"Great, put her license in it, we'll run it down to Med," Casey said.

"I think we'll swing by too, I want to see how Capp's doing," Severide told him.

"Uh, guys," Otis said hesitantly, "something's a little weird here."

"What?" Casey asked.

They turned and saw Otis holding the bag open, and saw several bills sticking out near the top. Upon closer inspection they saw several 100s folded up, but most of it was in 20s and 50s.

"Must be close to $5,000 here," Otis said.

Casey and Severide looked at each other.

"Where the hell'd she get that kind of money?" Casey asked.


"I'll find out where they took her," Casey told Severide as they entered the hospital, "you go check on Capp."

"Right."

Casey took the gym bag over to the front desk to call for Maggie, but both men heard someone behind them.

"Hey!"

They turned and saw a man coming in behind them. He looked to be in his 50s, clean shaven, short dark hair, and was dressed in a firefighter uniform, but they didn't recognize him, though he did bear some resemblance to half of the fire chiefs they'd had to answer to over the years.

"Do you guys know anything about a teen girl brought in tonight from a car wreck?" he asked.

"Yeah, we answered that call," Casey said. "I'm sorry, you are?"

"Roger McWhorter, I'm at Firehouse 27."

"Queenie's your daughter," Casey's eyes widened.

"That's right. How is she?"

"She's in with the doctors right now but she was doing alright when we got her out of the car," Severide said.

The man sighed like the weight of the world had just been lifted off his shoulders, but followed it up with, "That damn kid, what the hell did she think she was doing? She knows better."

Anything the two lieutenants might've said in response to that was quickly forgotten when they heard a commotion coming from down one of the corridors, and a few seconds later they saw the girl coming their way with a nurse following her. Somewhere between points A and B she'd gotten redressed in her white racing suit and was in the process of getting it zipped again. It was only now that Casey realized her blonde hair was buzzed close to her scalp, almost looked like him a couple years earlier.

"You need to let the doctors finish the exam," the nurse told her.

"I don't need an exam, I'm fine, I'm going home," she said, then came to a dead stop in her tracks when she saw who was in the room. Her eyes even took on a hint of panic. "Dad!"

"Queenie," he said, as if just acknowledging her for the first time.

She froze for a second but quickly recovered and started to say, "I can explain-"

"Save it," her dad told her. "Are you alright?"

She nodded.

"Good, go get in the car and wait for me," he told her.

She nodded again and headed for the exit.

"Don't forget your bag," Casey told her, "you left it in the car."

She took it without a word, scarcely even any recognition, and walked right past them.

"So I take it she still lives with you?" Severide asked.

"What's it to you?" Roger asked defensively.

"Nothing, just asking."

"Yes she still lives at home," Roger said, "you got a problem with that?"

"No," Casey replied. "I guess your wife was shocked when the hospital called."

"My wife ain't around these days," he told them.

"Oh, I'm very sorry."

"Yeah well...is what it is, right? Look, thanks for pulling her out of the wreck tonight, I gotta go."

The two lieutenants stood alongside each other and watched as McWhorter left, Severide murmured to Casey, "That was weird."

"Thank God, I thought I was the only one who noticed," Casey replied.

They heard the sound of somebody running down the corridor and saw Natalie heading their way.

"Is she gone?" she asked as she tried to catch her breath.

"Who?" Kelly asked.

"That blonde girl with the buzz cut."

"Yeah, she just left with her dad," Casey answered.

Natalie sucked in a deep breath and let it back out with a loud, "Dammit! Security got held up in a domestic episode in a private room, we tried reaching the front desk to get them to stop her from leaving, but there was no answer."

"What's wrong?" Kelly asked.

"Will," Natalie huffed and puffed a few times to catch her breath and explained, "Will was trying to examine her and she got hostile. I wasn't seeing anybody at the moment so I offered to help, thought she'd respond better to a woman. We got her on the table, thought she fell asleep. We stepped outside to discuss the matter, and she took off."

"Is she okay?" Casey asked.

"We weren't able to do any tests, we just got her clothes off, she has a lot of bruising that Will was concerned about and frankly, so am I."

"The car went into a ditch, how badly was she banged up?" Casey asked.

Natalie shook her head. "The bruises weren't caused by a car accident. Somebody hit her, a lot, several times, some of them were old, others are fresh."

"What?" Kelly asked.

"She has bruising on her arms, her thighs, her back, her stomach, some of them are clear hand prints from being beaten, or violently grabbed. She also has gouge marks up and down her body. I've seen enough of it on little kids to know what it looks like, somebody is abusing her."

Severide and Casey turned and looked at each other, but neither could say anything.