Part XI

Mike had just as pessimistic an outlook as Roy did over how he thought Poole would take Brackett's call. But they all agreed that the call needed to be made even so. Marco tried to look at it philosophically.

"We'll just have to ride out the storm. Luckily, there are five of us to do the bailing."

The beginning of their next rotation started quietly enough, though all of them involuntarily flinched every time that the phone rang. The tones going off was almost a relief. The call was for the squad only though, so only Roy and Johnny got a break from the tension.

When they pulled back in, Mike was discretely in their sight range. With his left hand, he made a slicing motion at neck height before returning to polishing the engine. They winced in unison. The call must have come in while they were gone.

As he had suspected would happen, Roy was only halfway out of the squad when the Captain's voice called out.

"DeSoto! Office! Now!"

As Roy headed there while Johnny watched with a concerned expression, Mike spoke very softly to him without stopping his polishing.

"We're not supposed to talk to each other anymore unless it's strictly work related. Watch yourself. We're all going to meet up at the diner when the shift ends."

"Right. Good idea."

Roy still hadn't emerged from the office a half-hour later. Then the tones sounded and finally brought an end to the 'meeting'. It was a full station run to a small shopping center. Captain Poole's newest twist threw everyone off. Instead of Roy and Johnny doing the sweep as usual, Poole teamed Marco with Johnny, sending the two of them for the main sweep while Roy and Chet were teamed on the hose.

It was idiotic use of their manpower, but what really worried Johnny about it was that he and Marco simply didn't have the rhythm together that he and Roy did. And he'd be willing to bet Roy and Chet were having the same problem. The sweep took more than twice as long as it would normally have. In this case, it didn't cause problems, but if the fire had been more intense or if more victims had been involved? The story could have been very different.

It was fortunate there were only two minor smoke-inhalation cases because, of course, Johnny was forced to tend to them by himself. Marco was able to man the biophone to relay information, but couldn't really do much to assist with the actual treatment. Again, at this fire, that was enough, but there were many occasions when Roy and Johnny needed to work in unison if a victim was going to have the best chance for survival.

Dixie noticed who was speaking over the link and frowned slightly. She didn't find out about Kel's call to the Station until it had already been made, but she still let Kel know her opinion that he might have just added fuel to the fire – no pun intended. When she got very quick details from Johnny when he rode in with the victims, she knew that the worst was probably yet to come.

The shift ended without further incident and the men of A Shift left, the five men heading for the diner. As he was driving by, Poole caught sight of Johnny's Rover. A closer look revealed the presence of other cars that he recognized from the station parked not far from the Rover. His blood pressure immediately started rising.

Poole didn't bother to think about how long this group of men had worked together or that they had been meeting after work here and at each other's homes for years. No, he took it as a sign that the men were again going behind his back. He didn't see how Stanley worked with any of this crew that flaunted authority so openly. Well, he'd break them of that.

The rest of the rotation was an absolute killer. The runs really weren't any worse than usual and they began to start adjusting to the change in which man they were teamed with. The trouble was at the station itself. Poole wasn't letting them have any downtime any longer. Beyond adding to the daily tasks lists, he had them doing drills constantly.

It was bad enough that after she heard Roy's voice over the phone, Joanne insisted on driving them all over to the DeSoto home, fed them a mound of toast and scrambled eggs and made them nap before she would drive them back to the station to pick up their various vehicles. She knew how exhausted they all were by the face that not a one of them argued with the plan. Not even the token resistance that they would normally put up about not wanting to inconvenience her.

When he emerged from what Joanne referred to as his coma, Roy wrapped his arms around his wife's waist as he wholeheartedly thanked her for her insistence. He hadn't wanted to ask, but he'd been worried about the possibility of one or more of them falling asleep while driving. She just leaned back against him

"Hey, I've got to take care of the men that watch your back when I'm not there to do it, don't I? I have towels lined up for showers and sandwiches ready in the refrigerator for use as they wake up."

"You're an absolute gem, Jo."

"You bet. And don't think for a moment I won't remind you of that fact periodically, Mr. DeSoto. How much longer until Hank comes back?"

"Two more rotations."

As Dixie had feared though? The worst was yet to come.