Chapter 4: Smoke Inhalation
They screeched to a halt outside the home of their suspect. The house was on fire, thick black smoke billowing from the windows.
Matt and Jennifer both jumped from the car, quickly followed by Simon and Duncan who had pulled up minutes after they had, and ran to the front of the house.
Matt kicked down the front door and Simon and Duncan ran around the back, he ran in with Jennifer close behind him.
He stopped dead in his tracks, "Jen, did you hear that?" he asked looking at her.
"Upstairs." Jennifer said as they made their way up the stairs towards the sound. Matt kicked in the door, and found a small girl all of five years old, crying in a corner.
"Hey sweetie, its ok, we're Police Officers." Matt said, scooping up the little girl into his arms.
By this time, the smoke had gotten thicker, heavier, making it harder to breathe, and the flames had engulfed the stairs, blocking their escape route.
"Quick Jen, this way!" Matt yelled, running back into the girls bedroom and too the window.
Opening the window, he yelled "Simon!!" Simon came running around the corner. "The stairs are on fire!" Matt yelled.
"Wait, I got it." Simon said running off around the corner, and re-appearing with a large trampoline.
Matt carefully dropped the little girl down to where Simon was standing, and then he jumped himself.
"Come on Jen!" Matt yelled.
Jennifer jumped out the window and onto the trampoline.
Matt wrapped an arm around her waist, their lungs burning as they coughed, breathing in fresh air and they made their way around to the front of the house where they were greeted by the sounds of sirens.
Two paramedics made their way to them and guided them to the ambulance.
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They arrived back at work half an hour later after getting cleaned up.
Jennifer sat down at her desk and continued to fill in paper work that had been abandoned hours before.
Every so often she would feel a tickle in her throat that made her cough. She thought nothing of it.
"Matt, Jennifer, Henry Marsh is on his way up now." Stanley Wolf said, before stepping back into his office.
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"Why did you leave your daughter at home by herself?"
"I went down to the shop to get some stuff." Henry replied.
"Well…" Jennifer started coughing. "Excuse me." She said, taking a deep breath in after she stopped coughing.
"Jen are you ok?" Matt asked concerned, looking at her.
"I'm fine." she replied clearing her throat. "Well can you um," she coughs again. "Mr. Marsh you said your, um," she bent forward a bit, bracing herself on the desk as she starting coughing again.
"What the hell is this? Good cop, crazy cop?" Henry said looking at Jennifer gasping for breath when she was coughing.
"Jen?" Matt said, looking at her as her face starting going red.
"I… can't breathe," she whispered, her knees giving out from under her, as she coughed, wheezing for breath.
"Hey, hey, hey." Matt said, catching her before she hit the floor, and slowly lowering her to the floor, yelling out, "OFFICER DOWN!! SOMEONE CALL AN AMBULANCE!!"
"Hang on Jen, help is on its way." Matt said, holding her.
"HURRY UP!! GET AN AMBULANCE!!!!" Matt yelled again.
Slowly Jennifer's breathing became more and more labored.
A hand fell heavily on his shoulder. "Matt," a voice said near his ear. "Matt, let go. The paramedics are here."
Not moving his hands, he looked up dumbly at Stanley. "What?"
"They're here for her," Stanley said, Matt turned his head toward the man, woman, and bright yellow stretcher that had appeared in the room.
He looked back down at Jennifer. Finally, it clicked in his head and he looked at the paramedics with eyes that actually saw them. "I'm . . . sorry." He wasn't sure if he could make himself pull completely away, and he was grateful to feel Stanley's grasp his arm to steady him as he stood up.
"She'll be ok," Stanley said, trying to reassure himself as well as Matt. "Stay with her."
The paramedics slipped in where Matt had been kneeling. Within seconds an IV line was channeling saline solution into her arm and they were strapping her to a backboard as quickly as they could. The board went up, onto the stretcher.
"Let's go," said the male medic. "Sir, are you coming with us?" he asked Matt.
"Yes! Yes, yes." He felt like he was at half-speed again. Everyone was running, calling, doing something, and he could only stand there, paralyzed.
"Then let's go. We need to get her loaded into the ambulance."
Matt nodded and tried to follow them, but stumbled.
"Whoa!" Stanley said, appearing again at his side. "I'll give you a hand out. You don't look too steady."
He didn't protest, just accepted the support as he trailed the stretcher out into the Melbourne afternoon.
"Heart rate?" the standing paramedic barked at his partner.
"Was one hundred and one dropping to eighty four." The female paramedic said as she opened the ambulance door. "Let's move."
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The doors of the ambulance opened as they pulled up at the hospital, Matt jumped out followed by the ambulance officers as they unloaded Jennifer on the stretcher. She had an oxygen mask on her face and an IV line in her hand.
They rushed in through the doors of the ER and doctors ran up to them and assisted in anyway they could.
They yelled out stats, but Matt took no notice to what they were saying.
"She's not breathing, commence CPR." On of the ER nurses yelled, that caught Matt's attention.
"One thousand, two thousand, three thousand, four thousand, five thousand." Said a doctor commencing compressions,
A nurse applied a face mask and bag then squeezed it once, simulating a single breath. The doctor then started compressions once again.
"Jennifer, sweetheart, you have to breathe, come on sweetheart, I need you to breath." Matt pleaded, holding her hand.
Then the doctor said, "She's breathing."
He felt the warm tears roll down his cheeks realizing how much Jennifer really meant to him.
tbc…
