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One of the first things Mateo had learned as a firefighter is that things happened quickly.
One moment you were searching a house with your friend, looking for a missing kid, and then the next everything went wrong. Things could turn from routine to disastrous in an instant and what side of the disaster you were on simply depended on luck and the whim of the universe. Today, it was in Mateo’s favor. The same could not be said for TK.
They had been working their way through the burning structure, trading quips even as they searched every corner for the missing child. It had been like old times, and Mateo had told TK as much.
“It’s been weird with you on medical, dude,” he informed TK, who rolled his eyes.
“It’s not like I moved, Mateo. We still work in the same place. I just ride in a different vehicle.”
“And go on separate calls! I mean, it’s cool and all — watching you guys work is badass — but it’s just not the same. It’s just…”
“Weird?” TK supplied wryly, and Mateo nodded.
“Don’t you miss this at all?” Mateo asked after a moment of silence. “Doing the rescues, running into the burning buildings.”
TK shrugged as they moved onto the next room, “Yeah, but I also love getting to do the medical stuff. Being a firefighter was something I loved, but being a paramedic feels more like a calling, like what I was supposed to be doing all along, you know?”
“Not really,” Mateo admitted, “but I’m glad you’re happy.”
TK tossed him a grin over his shoulder, “Thanks, Probie. Me too.”
Anything they could have said next was interrupted by Judd’s voice coming through their radios.
“It looks like things are moving faster than anticipated,” he said, “we need this structure cleared ASAP. Any luck in finding the missing kid?”
Mateo grasped his radio, lifting it up to update their acting Captain, “Not yet,” he told him, “but we’re nearly done with the west side of the second floor.”
“Get done faster,” Judd replied, “I’ll feel a whole lot better when y’all are out here.”
“Copy that, Judd,” TK replied into his radio, before motioning for Mateo to search the right half of the last room while he moved towards the left, “we’ll be out before you know it.”
So many things had to align for this moment to exist. It started with Cap out of town and Judd stepping in as acting Captain. It took Benson being out with the flu and Moran being off for his niece’s wedding. It all came down to TK still being dual certified and Judd asking him to suit up and help with the search, to help things move faster because the structure didn’t look like it had all that long. It was the fact that he had been paired with Mateo, that they had been assigned this corner of the house, that TK had been the one standing where the floor gave out. If he had been one more inch to the left, he would have been fine. If the crack had appeared even a few feet away, it would be Mateo at the bottom of a hole right now; not moving and a level away.
“TK!” he called, watching anxiously for any sign of movement. When he saw none he felt fear spike through his gut, drowning out everything else.
“Cap,” he shouted into his radio, even as he moved around the hole, towards the staircase he assumed would take him down to the first floor and TK. “TK is down! The floor collapsed under him and he’s not responding.”
“Can you get to him?”
“I think so,” Mateo replied breathlessly as he ran down the stairs as quickly as he dared, “I’m heading down to him now.”
“Give me a status update when you do, Chavez,” a new voice said and with a start, Mateo realized it was Captain Vega. “And make sure to be careful. Getting yourself hurt is not going to help anything.”
“Copy,” Mateo replied before dropping his radio and moving forward. He reviewed the layout of the second floor in his head, trying to determine where TK would have fallen. He turned into the first room on his left, hoping that his calculations were correct only to be greeted by the sight of his friend sprawled out on the floor, his stillness even more evident up close than it was from above.
“TK!” he called as he moved closer, kneeling down beside the prone figure. He glanced first at his chest, but he was face down and it was too hard with the smoke to see if he was breathing. With a shaking hand he pulled off one of his gloves and pressed two fingers to TK’s neck, waiting breathlessly for the telltale sign of a pulse thrumming against his fingers. He nearly toppled with relief when he felt it, strong and steady against his skin. He leaned back on his heels, reaching for his radio to update the Captains outside when he spotted something in the corner of the room.
With another glance at TK he rose from his position and crossed the room to the corner where he peeked behind a chair. A small boy was there, kneeling on the floor, a stuffed dog clutched tightly to his chest.
“Hi there,” Mateo began softly, “are you Evan?”
The boy nodded and Mateo smiled at him. “Hi Evan, my name is Mateo. Your Mom sent me and my friend to look for you. Will you let me take you to her?”
The boy didn’t say a word but gave another nod and took the hand Mateo reached out for him, allowing himself to be led out from behind the chair to the center of the room. Mateo grabbed his radio as they walked. “Cap, I'm going to need an assist here. TK has a steady pulse but he’s out and I just found our friend Evan. He’s going to let me take him back to his mom, but I don’t want to leave TK here.”
“Strickland is on his way to you,” Judd replied after a moment. “How’s the kid?”
“He looks fine, just scared,” Mateo answered.
“What about TK?”
“I don’t know,” Mateo admitted. “I don’t want to move him too much in case something is broken, but he seems to be breathing okay and his pulse is steady. He just hasn’t woken up at all.”
The silence that answered told Mateo that the others outside were feeling the same as him: worried but unwilling to put any of their fears into words.
Sudden movement next to him grabbed his attention as TK stirred. Mateo made sure Evan was settled beside him before he turned his focus to TK.
“Hey, TK,” he asked breathlessly, “can you hear me?”
There was a cough and a groan before TK’s voice responded, “Yeah, Probie, I can hear you. What happened?”
“What do you remember?” Mateo asked instead. He may not be a paramedic, but he was pretty sure that making sure the injured person knew where they were was important.
“We were looking for a kid,” TK started and Mateo nodded when he trailed off.
“Yeah, Evan. I found him. Or maybe you did, since you’re the one who fell down here.”
TK twisted to look at him blinking slowly as he tried to piece it all together. His eyes widened as he did, “The floor…”
“Fell right out from under you,” Mateo confirmed. “But Paul’s on his way so we can get both you and Evan out of here in one piece. You’ve just gotta hang on for a little bit.”
“No problem,” TK supplied with another cough and Mateo wasn’t sure he liked the sound of that, “I’m not going anywhere.”
Before Mateo could dwell on exactly how bad his friend sounded his thoughts, were interrupted by their radios once again.
“Chavez, Strickland’s not going to be able to get to you,” Judd told him grimly. “There was a delay in his sector and the situation is evolving rapidly. I don’t like the look of the smoke from out here, I need you to get the kid out now.”
“But TK…”
“You need to go, Probie,” TK said, cutting him off. “If Judd thinks it’s going to flashover or get worse, you need to get the kid out of here.”
“And leave you?”
“I’ll be fine,” TK told him in a voice that was probably supposed to be reassuring but was too weak for that. “I have my gear, I can wait it out. What’s important is getting that kid out of here.”
“But…”
“That’s the job, Probie,” TK reminded him firmly. “You can come back for me after.”
TK sounded so certain that Mateo wanted to believe him. And TK had been doing this far longer than Mateo, he should trust his judgment. But numbers on the heat of flames and ignition points and survival odds filled his head as well and he couldn’t just leave him here to die. That simply wasn’t an option.
“No.” The certainty in his voice surprised even Mateo. When TK raised an eyebrow at him he shook his head and stood his ground, “no. I am not leaving you here. I will get you both out.”
TK opened his mouth, no doubt to argue, but in the next moment flames shot up across the ceiling and Mateo was forced to dive for the young boy to shield him from the falling debris. Things seemed to settle a moment later and Mateo cautiously looked around. There were new bits of the ceiling across the room, some of them he saw with dread, were on top of TK, who once again didn’t seem to be moving.
Mateo needed to get to him and he needed to get them all out of here, but he needed to make sure Evan was okay first.
“Hey buddy,” he started softly, “are you hurt at all?” When he got a small shake of a head in response he smiled. “Good, that’s good,” he told the young boy. “Can you wait right here for a second while I help my friend? Then I’m going to get us all out of here, okay?”
He got a nod so he gave the kid one last smile before he turned his focus to TK. He got the debris off of him with no trouble before he checked his pulse again. It was still there and still steady, but his breathing felt worse. They definitely needed to get out of here now, TK needed help.
So he set about doing just that. He grabbed TK’s body as gently as he could, pulling him upright so Mateo could get his body over his shoulder and stand up, taking TK’s limp form with him. He staggered for a moment under the new weight but then he found his footing and straightened up, shifting so TK was secure with one of his arms gripping his friend. Then he bent down towards Evan.
“Hey little man,” he said brightly, trying to keep his voice even so as not to scare the kid, “you ready to get out of here?”
The little boy nodded and Mateo gave a silent thanks that the kid was light enough to be scooped up with one arm as he settled him against his chest. Then, with a quick reminder to keep his head covered, Mateo made his way to the door, one step at a time.
It was slow progress as he tested each floorboard before stepping on it, keenly aware he was carrying more weight than usual and that it was all precious cargo. At one point he was forced to ignore his radio and Judd demanded a status update. He didn’t have a hand left to answer it and besides; he’d be out there soon enough.
He had lost track of where he was and before he knew it the exit was in front of him. He hurried towards it, barely clearing the front steps when he felt a rush of heat behind him and a force from behind knocked him to his knees. He did his best to hold on to the two bodies he was clutching as he fell, tightening the arm around TK and pulling Evan closer to his chest. He felt TK slipping from his shoulder and held on tighter before he registered a familiar voice at his ear.
“I’ve got him, Mateo,” Paul was saying. “You can let go now, we’ve got you.”
So he did, releasing the grip he had on TK so Judd and Paul could take him over to medical before gently setting Evan on the ground where he ran over to where his mother watching from a few feet away with tears in her eyes.
“He seems fine,” Mateo said though he wasn’t sure to who, “but he took in a lot of smoke.”
“I’ll go look at him,” Marjan reassured him from where she was apparently standing beside him, squeezing his shoulder. “Nancy and Captain Vega have their hands full with TK at the moment. Are you good, Mateo?”
“Yeah,” he replied, clearing his throat against the thickness building in it, “I’m fine.”
She gave him a smile and another squeeze before she grabbed a medical bag and followed Evan, kneeling down in front of the small boy with a stethoscope held aloft and a kind smile on her lips. He was pulled away from the scene by another hand on his shoulder and he spun to see Paul standing beside him again.
“Paul,” he started, fear filling his chest again. Paul had been with TK. Was TK…
“Take a breath, Probie,” Paul instructed him evenly, steadily. “Captain Vega and Nancy are taking care of TK, let me take care of you.”
“Me?” Mateo asked with a frown, “I’m fine.”
“Let's make sure of that then,” Paul replied in the same even tone, reaching out a hand to help him up from the ground. He swore he was fine, but he swayed when he got to his feet and it was only Paul’s steady grip that kept him upright.
“That’ll be the adrenaline crash,” Paul noted, guiding him over to the back of the ladder truck where he could sit. Once he was settled Paul started giving him a once over, despite Mateo’s protests that he was fine.
“Humor me,” he said dryly. “Adrenaline can hide a lot and what you just did was badass. Gotta make sure you didn’t hurt yourself doing it.”
“I just did what I had to do,” Mateo countered with a self-conscious shrug. “I just needed to get them both out of there, so I did.”
“Doesn’t change the fact that it was badass,” Paul told him with a grin before stepping back, apparently satisfied with his findings. “And you’ll live another day to possibly do that again, congrats.”
“Told you I was fine,” he griped, but Paul’s response was interrupted by the sight and sound of the ambulance leaving, rushing away from the scene; TK in the back. Mateo felt the cold fear of finding his friend unmoving on the floor return as he looked back at Paul, “Did you find anything out?”
Paul shook his head, his good humor fleeing abruptly, “They didn’t say much. They just started working as soon as Judd and I got him over there.”
Mateo closed his eyes and put his head in his hands. Logically he knew there was nothing he could have done to stop this. It was a freak accident, just one of those risks that they faced every day. That didn’t change the fact that he had watched his friend fall, had seen the fear on his face the instant he realized what had happened. It didn’t change the fact that TK had told him to leave him behind, or that he had almost had to.
It didn’t change the fact that TK might not be okay and Mateo was going to have to find some way to deal with that.
“He’ll be okay,” Paul said bracingly as if he knew where his head had gone. Though knowing Paul, there was every chance he did. “TK’s made of tough stuff. He’ll pull through.”
Mateo swallowed and forced on a weak smile, “Yeah,” he replied, not meeting Paul’s eyes, “yeah, you’re right.”
But when he did eventually look up and meet his friend’s eyes he could see the truth: neither of them had any proof for the claims they were making. They were both just as scared and uncertain as the other, but for right now, it felt good just not to be alone in this.
It took them the better part of an hour to fully extinguish the fire in the house. By the time they wrapped up and dragged themselves back to the station, it had been nearly 3 hours and their shift was nearly up. Mateo thought he was too tired to do much of anything as they piled out of the ladder truck, but the sight of the ambulance parked in the bay sent a jolt of energy through him. He nudged Paul and gestured towards where Tommy and Nancy were restocking. Paul waved at Marjan and Judd and together they headed over to the ambulance.
“Hey T,” Judd called as they approached, “any news on the kid?”
They all waited with bated breath for an answer, but when Captain Vega turned to face them her expression was grim and Mateo felt his heart sink.
“Not yet,” she told them. “Carlos got there before we had to leave for another call and he promised to call us with any updates, but we haven’t heard from him yet.”
The hope they had allowed themselves to feel faded until the moment was interrupted by the sound of Nancy’s phone ringing. She dropped the bandages she was holding as she fumbled for it, barely glancing at the screen before she answered, turning away from the rest of them.
“Carlos?” she asked and Mateo could feel his heartbeat increase at the mere implication, “How is he?”
The station was so quiet you could have heard a pin drop at the other end as they all watched and waited, listening for any clue of TK’s fate. As they watched she relaxed, her shoulders losing some of their tension as she released a breath.
“Thanks, Carlos. Yeah, we’ll be there as soon as we can. Tell him he's an idiot from me until I can get there and do it myself.”
With that, she hung up the phone and turned to face them, her face a study in relief.
“He’s okay,” she informed them, a wide smile forming across her face. “It sounds like there was a lot of damage to his ribs which caused some complications, but he’s awake and breathing on his own.”
They shared a collective moment of relief before Marjan asked if they were all heading to the hospital. Obviously, they were, but Judd needed to finish up some forms, and Tommy and Nancy still had a few hours left on their shift, so it was only Marjan, Paul, and himself that arrived at the room number Carlos had texted them a half-hour later. No amount of reassurance from others could have met the level of relief Mateo felt at seeing TK sitting up in bed with Carlos at his side, smiling at them.
Both Paul and Marjan were across the room in an instant, but Mateo hovered in the doorway. He wasn’t sure why, but he felt nervous. TK had told him to leave him. He hadn’t listened. He wasn’t sure if he thought his friend would be mad at him or if simply the fact that he had carried him out of the burning structure made this weird. He wasn’t sure but something held him back from the others who were all smiles and gentle hugs. He felt Carlos’s eyes land on him and when he turned he saw him looking back towards his boyfriend.
Whatever he saw must have made up his mind because in the next moment he cleared his throat.
“Hey,” he said to Paul and Marjan, “would you two mind coming down to the cafeteria with me?”
Marjan opened her mouth, likely to ask why, but Paul lightly elbowed her and tilted his head towards Mateo. That was all it took for her to agree before she patted TK’s knee and promised to be back soon as she and Paul filed out of the room. Carlos leaned close to give TK a kiss before standing from his chair. He paused before Mateo in the doorway, leaning down to pull him into a hug.
Mateo was startled, but let himself be pulled into the embrace even as Carlos hugged him tightly. When he pulled away he stopped before releasing Mateo, meeting his eyes instead. “Thank you,” he told him softly, “for saving him.”
And Mateo didn’t know what to say to that, how to respond to the level of gratitude and love in Carlos’s eyes. He didn’t have to as with one last squeeze of his arms Carlos released him and stepped away, following the others down the corridor. Which left Mateo alone with TK; something he had never thought he would find as daunting as he did at this moment.
“I won’t bite, you know,” TK called out from inside the room and Mateo turned to see a wry look on his face. Mateo rolled his eyes but stepped inside, hands shoved inside his pocket. He settled into the chair just vacated by Carlos and looked over the man in the bed. He didn’t look too worse for wear. There were a few cuts and butterfly bandages littered across his face along with the nasal cannula, some forming bruises appearing across the skin not covered by the blankets or hospital gown, but all in all, he looked remarkably good for someone who had fallen through the floor of a burning building earlier today.
“How do you feel?” he asked eventually, not sure what else to say.
TK shrugged, then winced. “Sore, mostly,” he admitted. “My ribs are going to take a while to heal and I’m going to have some truly impressive bruises according to the doctor so I’m not imagining the next few days are going to be very fun, but from what I hear it could have been a lot worse and I have you to thank for the fact that it wasn’t.”
Mateo shrugged self-consciously. “We have to look out for each other,” he said, “right?”
“We do,” TK agreed with a nod, “but that doesn’t make me any less grateful. If you hadn’t done what you did, if you had listened to me and taken the kid out first, I probably wouldn’t be here right now. And I’m pretty fond of living, so it seems only right to thank you.”
“You would have done the same thing,” Mateo said evenly because he knew that was true. They all would have done the same thing in the same situation. What he had done didn’t make him special.
TK rolled his eyes, “Dude, you did a good thing. Own it and accept my gratitude, damn.”
Mateo couldn’t help but burst out laughing at that, successfully breaking whatever lingering tension there was.
“I’ll try,” he promised. “I just...I just thought you might be mad at me.”
“Mad at you?” TK asked, expression bewildered. “Why the hell would I be mad at you?”
“Because you told me to go!” Mateo exclaimed. “And I didn’t listen?”
TK stared at him for a moment before shaking his head. “Mateo,” he said evenly, “if I — or anyone else — is ever mad at you for saving them from a burning building, that is definitely their problem, not yours. And you should tell them that, especially if it’s me; because I’m being a dick.”
Mateo burst out laughing at that, and TK grinned at him. “I’m really glad you’re okay,” he said in the next moment.
“Me too,” TK agreed, leaning back against the pillows with a sigh. “That was pretty scary, I’m sorry you had to deal with that.”
“It was scary,” Mateo admitted, “but I don’t think I really noticed how scary it was until after, somehow.”
“That’s because you’re an excellent firefighter, Mateo,” TK told him with a warm smile. “We do the job we need to do when it needs to be done. Then we deal with the feelings after everyone is safe, including ourselves.”
“I thought I had been on some scary calls before,” he admitted after a moment, “but this one was the worst. You were in trouble and I needed to save someone else and I was all alone. I just felt like I wasn’t enough.”
“But you were,” TK pointed out. “You were enough and you always will be, because that’s who you are.”
Mateo grinned at him, swallowing against the thickness in his throat. He cleared his throat before speaking, but his voice was still thick as he spoke again.
“I don’t want to bring you down, dude,” he began, “but I think you might be cursed. There is no way this much bad stuff happens to a normal person without a curse. I know this Curandera…”
He was cut off by TK groaning and running a hand down his face, “Not you too, Probie,” he whined. “I just got this from Carlos. I’m not cursed, I promise.”
“Then if you’re not cursed then what’s the harm in trying?”
TK studied him for a moment before shaking his head with a laugh. “Fine, he said, raising his hands in surrender. “If it’ll make you all feel better, I’ll go do the witchy thing.”
“It does, actually,” Carlos said from the doorway as he entered, Marjan and Paul on his heels. “Though to be fair, at this point I was just going to take you anyways. I’m really glad you’ve seen sense on your own.”
“I don’t know how far sense goes,” TK grumbled, “but sure. If it makes you guys feel better, how can I say no?”
Mateo watched as Carlos rolled his eyes and planted a kiss on the top of TK’s head before turning to give him a smile. Marjan and Paul settled around him and it was all so normal Mateo could hardly stand it. He couldn’t believe they had nearly lost all this, again. For the first time in so long, he truly felt like he belonged; that he was exactly where he was supposed to be. And he wasn’t about to give that or these people up for anything — burning houses and weak floors be damned.
As long as Mateo had his way, his family would always be safe, and he would do whatever it took to keep them that way.