"Peace and quiet!" Captain Hank Stanley threw his long arms out to the sides when he entered the kitchen from the side door, still dressed in jeans and a grey and white striped shirt.
Marco and Mike both looked up at their captain, already in their uniforms and sipping steaming coffee from the well-used coffee mugs.
"What do you mean, Cap?" Marco asked as Mike returned to reading the front page of his newspaper.
"Chet and Johnny aren't here yet, and C Shift isn't back from that apartment complex fire they had this morning. Thank goodness for a quiet station, even if it is only for a few minutes."
Roy DeSoto walked in from the apparatus bay. "Mornin'." He said glumly.
"Aw, Roy." Cap's eyebrows pulled down low over his brown eyes. "Why the long face, pal?"
"Chris was up all night with an upset stomach." Roy's voice was monotone as he poured himself some joe and turned around to lean on the stove. "It was a long night."
"Hey, don't share whatever he's got with us, okay?" Marco twisted around in the chair to look at Roy as Johnny and Chet's bickering voices shattered the pleasant silence like a baseball crashes through a window.
Cap moaned, and his chin dropped to his chest. "Arguing already."
"Hm." Roy swirled the coffee around in his cup. "I wonder what it's about this time." But they didn't have time to find out because the growling of the station's truck and squad drowned out the squabbling in the background as the two pieces of machinery backed into the apparatus bay.
One by one, tired and sooty firefighters trickled into the kitchen seeking a caffeine boost to help their tired bodies function for a few more minutes until quitting time.
The four A shift men greeted the exhausted C shifters as they drank coffee and then moved on to the locker room for showers and to climb wearily out of their dirty uniforms.
Once Johnny and Chet came out of the locker room, both wearing scowls and shooting dirty looks at one another, Cap did roll call before releasing the men to go about their business. No sooner than the line had disintegrated that the tones went off again.
"Station 10, Station 51, Squad 14; multiple vehicle accident with injuries. Maple, cross-street Vine. Maple, cross-street Vine. Time-out, 9:43."
Cap ran to the microphone. "Station 51, KMG 365." He scribbled the correct address down on a scrap of paper and handed it off to Roy, who had the squad already started. Roy promptly gave the paper to Johnny without even looking at it. Instead, he pressed the accelerator and pulled out onto the street as Mike started the engine's motor to follow.
EMERGENCY!
Johnny climbed wearily out of the squad once his partner had backed it into the apparatus bay, slamming the door viciously before crossing his arms above his head and leaning them against the polished silver railing that ran along the top of the squad's compartments.
"Don't be so hard on yourself, Junior." Roy made the extra effort to walk the other way around the front of the vehicle to try to comfort his younger partner. "You did everything you knew to do, and Rampart did the same. Don't let it get to you."
"Don't let it get to me? Roy," Johnny turned his head to face his partner. "I watched a child die today! I saw his parents being loaded into the ambulance, unconscious, while their only son died in my arms."
"I know, Johnny. I was there too."
"Then why doesn't it bother you?" Johnny snapped.
Roy tilted his head to the side. "It does bother me, Junior. But I know it's part of the job; people live, people die."
"I know, man." Johnny's voice was quieter, more sad now. "But when it's the kids…"
Roy didn't really know what to say, he rarely did when they witnessed a young life snuffed out in the blink of an eye. He placed a reassuring hand on Johnny's shoulder and rubbed it a little bit. "Want any coffee?"
Johnny whispered, "Sure." and turned to follow Roy into the kitchen.
Cap, Marco, and Mike had already washed up and settled down in the kitchen, returning to whatever they had been doing before roll call. Roy walked to the stovetop, grabbed the half-full coffee pot and poured Johnny a cup before pouring himself one. Then both stood there sipping the warm liquid staring into space.
Chet, seemingly as bright and cheery as ever, came into the room, wiping his damp hands on his dark blue uniform pants. "Gage, there's something on your bed." Chet's cheeky grin contrasted sharply with the dark looks of gloom on the rest of the firemen's faces.
"Kelly," Johnny's voice sounded annoyed, warning Chet that he was most definitely not in the mood for any foul jokes that would later be blamed on "the Phantom".
"No, really!" Chet's smile either disappeared or became camouflaged in the hairiness of the mustache adorning Chet's upper lip. "A shoebox or something."
"What's in it?"
"I dunno."
"You mean you didn't look?"
"It's on your bed, not mine."
"Hmm." Johnny set down his coffee cup and stalked out of the kitchen, picking up a single file line of interested followers.
The entourage crossed the apparatus bay, and went through the swinging door into the bunk room. Johnny stopped directly inside the door, causing Chet to run into him.
Sure enough, on the end of Johnny's bed was a unmarked white shoebox.
"Maybe one of the guys from C shift left it." Johnny wondered aloud and then progressed carefully and slowly in case something nasty were to come flying out of the box in his direction.
When nothing emerged, Johnny sat down on the edge of his bed as Marco, Mike and Chet crowded around. Johnny pulled the box closer to him and carefully lifted off the lid.
He felt his heart skip a beat and his stomach drop. It was a baby.
"No way," Chet leaned down closer to see.
Johnny couldn't find any words to say as he stared down at the tiny infant. It was definitely premature, perhaps even so much as a three weeks to a month, and no older than three hours. Wrapped in a dirty old sheet with only its head protruding, the tiny eyelids were closed tight against the light. The chubby cherub cheeks and cupid's bow lips puckered for a moment before relaxing again.
"Chet, go get Roy and tell Cap to call it in. Oh," He called as Chet ran for the door, "Tell Roy to bring the OB kit."
Not bothering with gloves, Johnny slowly and carefully slid his hands under the baby's body, supporting the head and neck with his one hand. Cradling the newborn in his arms, he unwrapped the dirty sheet from the baby and let the sides flop over his arms. The baby girl didn't so much as stir when the November air hit skin.
"Is she even alive?" Marco knelt down to see better. "It looks like she's not breathing right."
Johnny carefully laid the sleeping baby on the bed and placed his fingers on her stomach. Sure enough, the infant seemed to be having trouble breathing.
Johnny pinched the baby's thigh in an attempt to make it cry, but no sound came forth from the newborn. Alarm bells were sent off through his mind when he spotted a bright red mark on the inside of the baby girl's thigh; a needle mark.
"Mike, I need the biophone."
The quiet engineer bolted from the room as Roy and Chet entered, Roy carrying the big OB kit.
"Roy, I think she's been drugged." Johnny called as he examined the mark more closely.
Marco and Chet skittered out of the way as Roy flung the OB kit onto the ground, creating a clatter.
As they both examined the baby, Mike reentered with the biophone. Johnny took it, opened the lid, set up the antennae, and turned it on.
"Rampart, this is Squad 51."
There was a brief moment of silence before Doctor Mike Morton's voice came on the air.
"This is Rampart. Go ahead, 51."
"Uh Rampart, we have a baby here, newborn, approximately one to three hours old, female. Seems to be suffering from difficulty breathing,"
Roy interjected, "Slow heartbeat. Pulse is 80, BP is…" He trailed off as he finished taking the blood pressure. "BP is 60/45 and respirations are 20."
Johnny relayed the vitals. Then he said, "Rampart, we have found a needlemark on the baby's thigh."
"Uh, okay, 51. Exactly how old is the infant?"
"Rampart, we don't know."
"Well then, ask the mother what that needlemark is from."
Johnny stalled. He glanced at the baby and then at Roy, who was rewrapping the newborn in a clean, sterilized blanket. "Rampart, the infant's mother is not available."
Now there was a moment of silence from the other end. Johnny imagined Morton throwing his hands in the air in exasperation. "Where is the mother, 51?" He snapped.
"Rampart, the baby was abandoned here at the station." Johnny said.
Another moment of silence before a different voice took over, this time Kel Brackett's. "Do you have an ambulance at your location, 51?"
"Negative, Rampart."
"Well get her in here, stat."
"10-4, Rampart. On our way." Johnny closed up the biophone and handed it back to Mike while Chet took the OB kit and ran it back to the squad.
"How fast can we get there, Roy?" Johnny reached his hands out for the baby, and Roy gently settled her in his arms.
"Faster than we normally can." He peeled off the gloves and dropped them on Gage's bed. "Let's go, Junior." Roy grabbed the empty shoebox and it's lid after stuffing the dirty sheet inside and beelined it for the squad.
Johnny walked fast, and when he arrived at the squad, it was already running and the lights flashing. Chet opened the door and closed it again after Johnny had climbed inside.
EMERGENCY!
Roy kept glancing over at his partner as he sped through the streets as fast as he darned. Johnny's face was concentrated fully on his tiny charge that slept in his arms.
Oh boy. Roy thought to himself. He's getting attached already.
A few minutes later, as they were nearing the hospital Johnny said, "Roy, look! There's a note!" He stuck his hand into the box and emerged with a piece of crumpled paper. He held it up and read it aloud.
"To whomever this may concern, please take good care of this baby. I hope that since you are a fireman, you are an honorable man. Please don't try and find me; I'll be dead in a few hours. The baby's father is also dead, so don't bother. Please don't place her in foster care, because I grew up there and it was a horrible experience. Thank you very much, the baby's mother."
Johnny's face grew stoic and he dropped the note back into the box as he stared down at the angel-like face slumbering peacefully within the folds of the snowy blanket that seemed to dwarf her.
How could anyone abandon such a vulnerable person? Johnny began to grow angry the more he thought about the deed. What kind of-
"Maybe she had a good reason, Johnny." Roy's calm voice interrupted Johnny's beginning internal rage.
"Huh?"
"I can read you like a book, man." Roy laughed a little. "Maybe the baby's mother had a good reason for leaving it at the station."
"Roy, name one good reason to drug your baby up! I hardly doubt she had a reason for that!"
Roy just shrugged. Johnny had him on that one. The two sat in stony silence as the squad rushed onward, sirens blaring, towards Rampart General Hospital.
Roy was thinking about his own kids, Chris and Jenny, and his wonderful wife Joanne. They had welcomed two children into their home, and he couldn't imagine not wanting your own child.
Johnny was scrutinizing the infant carefully, all the time feeling a paternal urge to protect the helpless babe whose very parents had left her alone at the mercy of some unknown fireman. In the back of his mind, he wondered if the hospital or the state would let him keep the child. Oh well, they'd find out soon enough.
Roy slowed as he entered the hospital emergency entrance driveway, and when they pulled up in front of the electronic doors, the tiny baby let out a contented sigh.
You know you're safe now, don't you, little one? Johnny smiled.
