It was fire prevention week. A week dedicated to teaching people how to react to and prevent fires both in and outside of their homes. Also a time for the various Fire Houses across the city to do public outreach to their local communities.
Almost every firefighter was 'greatly encouraged' to take part in one of the activities the city and fire department was putting on during the week. Bobby and Hen had volunteered to go to one of the nearby elementary schools to give the kids a fire safety talk. Chimney had been voluntold to give tours of their fire station.
And somehow Buck and Eddie were signed up to run in the City's 5 mile run. They had both originally thought that by volunteering for that it meant they were volunteering to help for the run, as in giving water out at a water station or helping at the First Aid stand.
It was only the day before that they were told they would actually be running it.
"Why are you complaining, Buck?" Bobby asked him at the end of their shift the day before. "Don't you go on a six mile run four times a week? This should just be regular to you."
"But you don't get it Bobby," Buck said exasperated. "My workout plans have a schedule. This is completely messing it up!" Everyone around them rolled their eyes at this, long tired of hearing Buck tell everyone about the workout schedules he makes for himself.
Bobby only smiled at him. "Well it looks like your schedule will just be a little messed up this week."
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The route was a simple route in theory. It was more on the outskirts of the city, starting at one Fire House and ending at another. It mostly consisted of running along asphalt and concrete, but there was a short portion that ran through a park, across some rocky ground on the side of a non-steep hill.
It was along that piece of rugged terrain that for one second, Buck lost his footing while his attention was distracted by a group of kids playing soccer in a nearby field. In that two second lapse of judgment, Buck misside the loose stone that his foot stepped on and sent sliding.
Buck cursed as his leg fell out and his knee slammed on the ground hard, drawing blood. But beyond the slight pain in his knee, his ankle was screaming at him.
It was definitely sprained, maybe even broken.
He hissed as he sat up carefully and looked down at his leg. His knee looked bad with all of the blood covering it, but he was more concerned about his injured ankle.
"Hey dude, you okay?" He heard someone say as they ran up to him and squatted down next to him. "I saw you fall down there, it looked pretty bad."
Buck wanted to say he was fine and get back up and finish the run. He had already run four and a half miles, what was another one? But he knew that trying to stand up and walk right now would be a terrible idea.
"Woah dude!" one of the other runners came up to him and knelt down. "Saw you tumble there, are you alright?"
Buck brought his hand down to his ankle, touched it, and felt pain race up from his ankle. "No, don't think so," he said, wincing.
"I think we should get you to one of the aid stations."
"Yeah, I think I need it."
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Later, Eddie found Buck lying on one of the small gurneys in the First Aid tent. "You know," he started. "If you really wanted to work in here instead of going on the run, you could've probably asked someone?"
"Oh, ha ha," Buck grumbled as he rearranged the ice pack on his ankle. "That's real funny."
"What even happened to you?" Eddie asked as he pulled a chair over and sat down next to Buck.
"Didn't watch where I was stepping," Buck grumbled. "Took a tumble and banged my ankle."
"Am I going to need to take you to a hospital?" Eddie asked as he took a closer look at Buck's ankle. In the time it took to get from where he fell over to the Fire Station and get some ice, his ankle had started swelling rapidly. Buck looked down at his leg and flexed his toes. A flash of pain shot up his leg and he let out a hiss. "I'll take that as a yes then," Eddie said.