Chapter 19

It was about an hour after Johnny had left on his run, He had brought the cardiac patient back but just as he was going to run up and see his wife another call came in and Squad 51 was off again on an unknown type rescue.

Dixie managed to take a break and slip up to spend a moment with Elise. She found her lonely and frustrated because she was stuck in her bed without someone to walk with her in case she had a seizure. Dixie was willing to fill the void and the two women wandered the halls together for a few minutes and talked. Dixie probed for the names of magazines Elise might like to read, And Elise probed for information about John, foods he liked, places he liked to go, activities he liked to participate in. Elise knew the chemistry was there between the two of them but truly wanted to be everything he ever wanted her to be. Elise wanted nothing more than Johnny's happiness and if that meant learning a few new recipes or doing something that she didn't particularly like once in a while she was willing. All though the truth be known there wasn't anything that Dixie listed that she didn't also enjoy.

"Nurse McCall wanted in emergency, Nurse McCall wanted in emergency," was heard overhead putting an end to the walk and conversation as Dixie handed Elise off to the nearest nurse and responded to her page.

Elise was thrilled when her Lawyer arrived just after lunch and her sister nearly half an hour later. There was plenty to discuss and Elise wanted to know just how much she couldn't remember. And the first thing the three of them did was open a box of real estate transactions and start making a time line to help put things into perspective. By the time the arson investigation team arrived Elise felt much calmer about what they wanted to know but still didn't have all the answers they wanted from her.

Fortunately they had been briefed about Elise's medical issues by her doctor and had been able to do a little research of their own into Elise's real estate practices and were sure she wasn't their arsonist.

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Back at the station the squad was out on yet another run when JoAnne showed up with the four children. Cody ran toward the fire engine in sheer excitement and then stopped short about two feet from the engine and placed her hands behind her back and just looked at the dials on the side as she rocked on her feet.

"Can, can I touch it?" she asked in breathless excitement and Mike gave her the biggest smile he could give.

"Sure you can touch it," Mike responded and watched as she stretched her hand out and carefully, in fact downright timidly pressed her forefinger against the red of the engine between the gages.

"How come you have so many clocks on your fire engine?" Cody asked, "Does telling time help you to put out a fire?"

Mike smiled at the innocent question and sat on the running board to be at her level. "Those are not clocks they are gages. They tell me how fast the water is rushing through each of the hoses." Mike answered; this was not the normal tour of the station. These children wouldn't fully comprehend how many gallons of water was stored in the engine or how many bathtubs full of water the hose could dump on a fire in one minutes time. To them fire truck were exciting and bright red and they wanted to see one up close. Tobes kept very busy asking questions and taking pictures of all the fire men and the equipment but he lacked the excitement that his sister had for the place.

The children were trying on the turn out gear and being taught about it when the Squad backed into the bay, Mike, Marco, Chet and JoAnne worked together to keep the children out of the way and where they would be safe until the engine of the squad was turned off.

After a round of hugs and the completion of the explanation about turn outs the children were invited to the kitchen to share some popsicles with the firemen.

"Where him spots?" Cody asked excitedly as she stood near the couch pointing at one very lazy basset hound lounging on the sofa. "Fire dogs hafta have spots, Dachel read me the story, they is all white dogs then get spots when they gets hugs with dirty hands from the smoke at a fire."

"Well, ya gotta understand," Chet figured he had the explanation the girl would believe, "Henry here isn't a real fire dog, he just came for a visit one day and we let him stay and keep all the dust off of our couch."

Timidly the little girl moved closer to the dog and was about to touch his nose when the dog licked her finger and she squealed and jumped back.

"Did he bite you," John was quick to his new niece's side and looking over her finger.

"No, he no bite, he just tasted me," Cody explained.

Tobias continued to take pictures and once the popsicles were finished, including one for Henry that Tobes got a picture of, Tobias had a question for his fire fighter tour guides. "Uncle Johnny said that your sirens were so loud they would hurt Rachel's ears, can we hear them?"

"You didn't let them hear the sirens?" John questions his crew mates.

"We hadn't gotten to that point yet when you got back," Mike explained and the four children, two of them holding their daddy's hands walked back into the bay were Mike opened the door to the engine and Johnny lifted Cody and then Tobes up to sit in the cab so they could see the knobs and levers that Mike was pointing out. Roy took his two children to the other side of the cab and lifted them up so they could sit in the captain's seat and see from there.

Chris DeSoto was sitting in the middle seat pointing out all the stuff he thought was exciting and Mike just let him lead the discussion only stopping him to correct any miss information he was giving. Once everything in the cab was explained the children were invited to turn on the sirens. Roy encouraged his excited son Chris to hold back since he had the chance to come to the station any time he could convince his mom to bring him. Cody was way too scared to flip the switch while Tobias was hesitant slowly he reached out to the switch and you could almost see Chris going mad at the length of time Tobes was taking to do such a simple and exciting task.

Once the switch was flipped two children quickly clapped their hands over their ears and started crying.

"Owe, owe, owwie," young Cody cried uncontrollably. Tobias was more silent but it was clear he was in pain as he held his hands over his ears and tried to roll up in a ball with silent tears trailing down his face.

Mike was quick to turn the siren off as John reached past him and pulled Tobias into his arms and then accepted Cody as Mike lifted her down. Hurrying to the back of the squad John set the two young children on the back bumper and pulled his pen light out. Shining his light into the children's ears revealed some dark drainage in Cody's ears but not much in Tobias's.

"Looks to me like they probably have ear infections," John looked over at his partner to see if he concurred.

"The only way to know for sure is for them to be seen by a Doctor." Roy admitted his limitations. Roy then gave his wife a quick glance, "I'll go give Dix a call and let her know what we suspect. She'll be able to take it from there."

Before Roy was finished on the phone a call came in for the station. As the klaxons loudly toned through the station John cradled the two children to his chest cupping his hands against one ear and letting his chest muffle the sounds to their other ears.

Station 51, station 63, truck 10 structure fire at a chemical plant respond with caution, repeat respond with caution the far end of the frontage road off Breaker street, far end of the frontage road off Breaker street.

When the loud PA system stopped much quieter commands were given within the station. "Station 51 KMG365" Captain Stanley called into the mic as everyone in the station other than John and Roy raced for their spot on the engine while the bay door cranked open.

"Dixie'll be ready for ya just take them straight to ER." Roy called to his wife after sticking his head around the corner of the squad.

John then handed his charges over to JoAnne's care and while she held them together in her arms at the back of the apparatus bay John climbed in the squad and pulled his helmet on his head and tightened the strap under his chin. With a piece of paper thrust into his hand John directed Roy to turn left out of the station and they were off.

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When JoAnne walked through the emergency room doors holding the hands of two children who held on to the other two, she wasn't in the least bit surprised to see Dixie and Rachel standing together waiting for them.

"We're set up in 4 for these two." Dixie said with a smile and Rachel took hold of her two's hands and welcomed JoAnne to follow with her two children if she wanted.

It only took about ten minutes to get both children diagnosed and taken care of, Rachel had asked permission for Tobias to take pictures to use for show and tell and that slowed them down a little. The biggest time stopper came when Tobias answered Dr. Morton's question. "Well aside from the sirens hurting you sick ears did you two have a good time at the fire station?"

"It was okay," Tobias answered with a down turned face, "the stuff they do and the things they have to do it with are great but no one will ever let us do anything like that we're just Indians."

The first thing Dr. Morton did was pick both children up and set them on the treatment table he then sat on a stool to bring the best eye to eye contact he could with the two children. "Don't you ever let anyone tell you that. It doesn't ever matter what color your skin is it's what's inside of you that counts. You can do anything you want when you grow up and the only thing that matters is if you're willing to work hard enough to get where you want to go not what color your skin is."

"But lots of people say we're no good because we's Indians," Tobias spoke still holding his head down.

"There are a lot of people in this world that only know one way to make themselves feel better and that's to make other people feel like they're not as good," Dr. Morton started treating a disease known as bigotry, "it's not true, In fact I know that your new Uncle, John Gage is an Indian and he's proud of it. Now he's a fireman and a paramedic and there's not anyone out there who is better than he is at what he does. You can be good at whatever you want to do if you're just willing to put in the work and can ignore what other people are telling you about your skin color."

"Did people tell you that you's no good because you have different color skin?" young Cody asked so sincerely that Mike just placed his hands on her shoulders and nod his head.

"They were wrong because I wouldn't allow them to be right." Mike answered, "I decided what I wanted to do and worked hard to get what I wanted."

"Did you sometimes feel bad about your skin color?" Cody asked again.

"There were times I was upset about my skin color before I learned that it's what's inside that really counts."

"Is that why you drawed pictures on your skin," Cody pointed to the tattoo on Dr. Morton's arm, "so that you could make friends."

Mike looked down at his tattoo from his days in the navy. Shaking his head he marveled at just how close the young girl was to the truth of the situation that led to him getting that tattoo. "It was something like that, but I learned that there are a lot better ways of making friends than to put pictures on your skin, and with what I know now I wouldn't do it again." he said with a smile as he ruffled the little girl's hair.

Their conversation was brought to an end when a nurse stuck her head in the door. "We've got 18 victims of a chemical factory fire coming in we need to open all the rooms we can and get everyone ready."

"Do we know what chemicals?" Dr. Morton asked as he followed the nurse out the door.

Dixie directed the children and their parent's out of the room as she made a quick change of the sheet on the exam table.

Once in the hall JoAnne over heard the staff talking about several firemen being injured in an explosion during the fire and Jo knew she needed to hang around at least until she knew her husband and his partner whom she had adopted as a brother were not one of the injuries.