Chapter 4

Hank stopped at the door with the name Chief Houts painted on it. Twice he reached up to knock only to pull back and take a deep breath. On his third attempt he carried through and when the door was opened the High Chief looked happy to see him.

Hank was given a firm hand shake and he noticed he was watched carefully as he walked to the chair he was directed to and sat down.

"You're looking a whole lot better than I expected you to be from these reports I've been reading," the Chief commented as he took his place behind his desk and pulled one of the many files that were on his desk into his hands and opened it up. "That was some fire you responded to," He spoke while perusing the file in his hand. "you should have never been responded alone on that one, with all the hullabaloo on the hotel bombing down town at the same time, we'd of had to pull from out of the response area but we should have got them on the way in the beginning and then turned them around if it turned out that we didn't need them. I've filed a reprimand with the Dispatching Department so hopefully that will never happen again. Still you did one hell of a job out there."

"Thank you Sir." Hank responded to the pause after the compliment given to him.

"Your entire crew will be receiving commendations for your actions that day. Engineer Michael Stoker will receive a second one for what he did in getting all of you out after everything went wrong. We're just trying to decide when and where to present them to you. I usually try to wait till the recipients are back on the job unless it looks like a career ending injury."

"I know I'm not expecting anything, I'm pretty sure the rest of my men feel the same way. We were doing our job as always. Whenever and wherever you choose will be fine." Hank responded feeling very humble.

"Don't you have a trip to New York with your daughter's dance group coming up?" the chief asked and Hank once again blushed that his high commander had seen him performing a ballet, in fact a very large number of his fellow members of the fire department had been there at least one of the three night.

"My wife informed them that I probably wouldn't be able to accompany them after the accident," Hank informed. He was really both remorseful and relieved about not being able to chaperone a bunch of teenagers to a large city where he just knew at least one of them was going to get lost, injured or worse. "They're still hopeful but I understand that with the time I've been off so far since the accident that I need to return to work even if it is only a desk job for the time being."

"I'm sure there is going to be a lot of walking involved in this trip are you physically up to that?" Chief Houts questioned, "Have you even spoke with your doctor along those lines?"

"Um, no sir," Hank squirmed in his chair, "as I told you I understand that I've had my time off and feel a need to return to work."

"Well your first assignment is to find out from your doctor if this trip is something you can do without setting you back as far as reaching full duty readiness." The Chief surprised Hank, "you worked hard and earned the right to go and it will be great PR for the department to have you along."

Hank blushed and squirmed a little more at the term 'PR' being used. No one makes it to the level of high Chief without noticing that sort of thing.

"Relax; I'm not going to have you followed by a bunch of TV cameras." The Chief started to calm the blushing Captain before him. "The PR I'm talking about is the influence you have on those kids. You forget, I know about the incident with the smoke bomb, but I don't think you know that I also know about the incident with the young diabetic. The principle had a lot to say to me while we were planning that little presentation for you and it was well worth listening to. He told me how you not only took care of the incident and assured the young girl got proper care quickly, but he also told me how you gathered the cast and talked to them about drug abuse and about the importance of giving information on their friends who might be using. He said that you had gained a trust with those young people that very few adults ever achieve. I was very impressed at the way that you took advantage of that situation and used that advantage for the better. I also know that you went to the hospital and talked with the girl's parents and all that you did to make it possible for that young girl to continue on with the production.

"I also noticed the looks on each of the cast member's faces the night of the presentation; they knew they were important to someone when you introduced each and every one of them to me, remembering not only the part they played but their name also. That's the kind of PR I'm talking about. You can bet that none of those kids will be building oversized smoke bombs in the near future, and they'll be a positive influence on the kids they pall around with. That kind of influence sure makes our job a lot easier."

Hank sat stunned at the high Chief's words.

"Besides with as many of you on light duty as there are right now, I'm running out of desk jobs," the chief added with a smile.

Hank added a nervous smile but remained quiet.

Chief Houts then leaned forward on his desk and took straight at the nervously squirming fire Captain in front of him. "You can tell me it's none of my business if you like, that's fine with me, but I'm going to ask any way. What prompted you to take up Ballet?"

Hank filled his cheeks with air and slowly blew it out. "Well Sir, I have a daughter that was having a hard time being a fireman's daughter." Hank began, "She was extremely worried about me getting injured or even killed on the job. So much so that she wasn't able to sleep on the nights I was on shift.-"

Hank continued till he told the story of her falling while trying to run off a Caffeine high before showing him a magazine article and how in time he realized it wouldn't hurt so gave it a try to help put her at ease while he helped her work through her fears. Then he added that he did feel a little more flexible and that ballet worked on muscles in ways regular calisthenics didn't. Finally he admitted that he was enjoying the closeness with his daughter as he watched her excel in her dancing.

He had no intention of telling him about the incident in the warehouse where he jumped across a opening made by a floor collapse to get to his men.

When he finished speaking the Chief leaned back in his chair with a look of wonder on his face. After a moment of silence he picked up another file from his desk and opened it. He silently read for a while glancing over the top of the file at Hank from time to time. "Can you explain to me why everyone of your men have joined you, , in the dance studio?" The chief chose to try and be discrete since the captain before him still seemed somewhat, in the closet, about his dancing.

Hank again squirmed as he silently thought hard about how to answer that question. "Well, I, um, I guess they've seen how it's helped me, especially after an injury, and gave it a try."

"Well there must be something to it," the chief tossed the file down on the desk and looked at Hank. "Your men are recovering twice as fast as any other firemen with the same injuries. At the rate your going you're all going to be back to full duty in half the time the doctors expected you to at the time of your injuries. Usually it takes significantly longer than the doctor's prognosis because we have to make sure you can do the heavy lifting and are as close to 100 percent as possible before we can put you back out on the line."

The Chief paused for a moment watching closely, "When you get back from your trip, and yes I'm pretty sure you'll be going, I would like you to put together a report telling me about this type of physical therapy and its positive effects, and then I want to meet with you and all of your men."

When Hank left the Chief's office he went straight to a public phone and called his wife. After telling her what the Chief and he had talked about he then called the hospital to see about getting an appointment to see Dr. Brackett. He was told to come right in and the doctor would speak with him as soon as possible, when he got there he found Dr. Brackett at the nurse's desk waiting for him.

-0-

"Well, I have to agree with your Chief," Dr. Brackett talked with Hank after he'd examined him and giving him the green light to go on the trip to New York. "What I've seen in the recovery of you and your men is nothing short of truly remarkable, your own injuries especially. If it's alright with you I'd like to read a copy of that report when you get it done. It just might affect the kind of therapy I recommend in the future, particularly when it comes to firemen."

-0-

When the group got together for their next work out everyone was sharing details of their light duty assignments. When Hank told them what his was the room turned suddenly silent.

"Are you sure that qualifies as light duty Cap," Mike could only think of the weight of the luggage he'd be carrying.

"News of this gets out their going to have firemen getting hurt on purpose," Chet countered.

"Na, it's one of those perks of learning how to dance so well." Johnny contended, "Hey Cap can you bring me back a picture of the Rockets?"

"Hey yeah, me too," Chet chimed in again.

"I'll see what I can do," Hank smirked.

Roy had been looking at his daughter who just happened to be working with Kristen while he was doing his work out. Jenifer was arguing that Kristen wasn't teaching her right and when Kristen explained that boys and girls danced differently Jenifer insisted on learning to dance like a boy so that she could dance with her daddy.

"I'll tell you what Cap. When Jenifer goes on one of these trips I'll give them you and Emily's name and number." Roy had done a few stints of chaperoning and knew it was no picnic. He had been chaperoning when he first saw his Captain dancing on stage and had been so wrapped up in getting the boys to behave he didn't realize he was watching his Captain until he made his final bow.

-0-

Ten days later Hank was herding a bunch of excited and rambunctious teenage boys through the boarding tunnel and onto a plane headed for New York, New York. Already on board was his wife who was working to get the girls, including their daughter, seated. The rest of their children were staying with the Stokers until they returned. Hank only hoped that they'd help with the twins and allow Mike's back to heal while he was gone.

When Hank and Emily finally took their seats, together but between the two groups of students, Hank looked at his wife as he buckled his seat belt, "Are we having fun yet?"

Seven hours and three filled barf bags later the plane was landed again and Hank was herding his charges off the plane and directing them in gathering their suitcases. Hank himself followed his doctor's advice and invested in a cart for his, his wife's and Daughter's luggage. He was very careful when he lifted the bags off the conveyor belt making sure he had all of his weight over his good leg and lifting in that manner.

For the next six days Hank somehow managed to keep his charges together while they toured the main attractions of New York. He also learned that a casual walk in New York was closer to what these Californians thought of as a jog, that he was grateful for elevators; he sure would have hated life if he'd had to climb the stairs to the top of the Empire State Building, and that boy's who got air sick also got sea sick. The same three that threw up on the plane also threw up on the boat ride to Elis Island. Thank heavens for barf bags.

There were nights his leg told him he had done too much, but not every night, Hank managed to keep up on his physical therapy by working out with the group and welcomed every opportunity to help his daughter show off her skills. Unknown to him there were representatives from the Rockets watching and they earned the group an invitation to watch the famous dance troop rehearse. An hour of watching them rehearse and everyone was tired, still some of the group accepted the invitation to go on stage and work on the chorus line with the dancers. Just for fun of course.

During the competitions their group walked away with several awards. Then, Six days, twelve rolls of film, another seven hours on a plane and four filled barf bags later, Hank and his wife were herding their charges to the bus that would take them back to the school where parents would relieve them of their charges. Hank made sure to inform a few parents of the need for Dramamine for any future trips.

They were tired and in need of a day to just catch up on their sleep but Hank realized that he wouldn't have missed it for the world. Emily shared the same feelings with Laura Stoker when she picked up the rest of her charges.

Arriving in the mail a few days later were professionally done pictures showing Hank and Kristen dancing in the chorus line with the Rockets. Emily was eager to get them in the family photo album even though she knew the only time she'd be able to show them to anyone outside the immediate family, was if Hank wasn't home.

Authors Notes:

I did a very brief rundown of the reason Hank got into dancing choosing not to repeat the story if anyone hasn't read it and wants to, that story is 'Perhaps we should Dance.' .net/s/4989506/1/Perhaps_We_Should_Dance

The details of the smoke bomb and the incident with the Diabetic student, along with details of the presentation ceremony can be found in 'The Nutcracker.' .net/s/6518251/1/the_Nutcracker

Nickel knowledge concerning chapter 3, it is limited knowledge that men wearing pantyhose or a girdle helps to relieve pain when suffering a hernia, My father has had two such surgeries as well as my husband, as well as some lower back pain. The reason for the limited knowledge in my opinion is that even thought it helps the men who wear them will never admit it. Similar items are now specially designed for men but are hard to find and very few men that I know of will ask for them, the pantyhose or girdle's they can get their wives to pick up and pretend they're for them.