Work Text:
“…keep talking to me, Buckaroo.” Hen grunted as she worked on clearing a path to the double doors on the other side of the wrecked auditorium.
Buck groaned from where he lies in a heap on the floor, trying to stay below the smoke. “I…I dunno...what to talk about.”
“We both know that’s a damn lie.”
Buck groaned, but it was probably meant to be a chuckle. She spared a glance back at him, noting he was still holding the towel she kept in her med bag to his abdomen.
It wasn’t looking good.
20 Minutes Earlier
There was a fire at an old abandoned school that was known to be frequented by drug addicts, houseless folks and horny teens (the last of those groups seemed to enjoy decorating the structure with semi-graphic graffiti and used condoms).
Both Buck and Hen were working on the B shift to cover a few of the guys out with the flu, so they’d been paired together to do a sweep of the western part of the structure, which was only seeing smoke at that point.
“Did you know that there was a fire in this school like 60 years ago? It was caused by a lightning strike during a heavy storm; completely wiped out the auditorium and the cafeteria and everything below that section of the first floor. They say that a janitor that lived on-site was killed by the smoke and that sometimes when it’s real quiet, you can hear is ring of keys jangling as he roams the halls.”
Hen shook her head as she led their way through the stairwell to the second floor. “LAFD, call out!” She hollered before pausing to listen. When silence answered her she turned to her current partner and hissed “Buck, are you seriously telling me a ghost story about a man who died of a fire in this building while it is actively on fire? At night, no less?”
Buck grinned at her sheepishly. “Uh, yeah. Sorry.”
“No more Buck Facts.” She huffed, turning to go back up the stairs.
She could practically feel his pout, but Hen was having none of it. She already knew the story of this school, had heard about it as a girl it always given her the creeps. She'd even been made fun of for being too afraid to break in with her high-school friends to smoke and tag the walls.
This place was putting her on edge, so she did feel a little bad about hurting Buck's feelings, but she’d make it up to him later.
Now
Well, now it’s later and their easy sweep had turned into an inferno, the floor beneath them had collapsed, spilling them into the auditorium on top of the 60 year-old wreckage they’d never bothered clearing away and Buck had very conveniently gotten a ragged gash across the abdomen.
“Talk about anything.” she told him when he was quiet too long.
She was frantic but careful as she grabbed chunks of debris and tossed them aside. It looked like when the original fire happened that workers had simply drug all the burnt and damaged wood and furniture and glass into the center of the auditorium and left it there to rot. It had been picked through over the years for firewood and other comforts to the people who called this place a home, but there was still plenty left to cause a problem even before they'd tumbled in, bringing half of what was probably a third-grade classroom with them.
Buck coughed. “Tho—thought you didn’t want to hear any more facts today.”
And if that wasn’t a punch in the gut.
“Baby, you tell me about anything you want, just keep fucking talking.”
Buck laughed, but it was a choked and dismal sound.
“D..did you know that hens will sometimes adopt? Like…not only other chickens, but like…piglets and kittens…and…”
“Puppies?” She supplied, trying to fake a chipper demeanor she did not feel.
“Yeah,” Buck said slow and sweet. “Hens are tough and just…just gotta take care of everyone…take 'em under their wing. That's where that comes from, y'know.”
"No, I didn't know." She grunted out as she moved a chunk of concrete.
Buck didn't say anything after that.
Hen radioed in to check on where the help was, but they were still too far away, separated by a wall of fire. She looked back at Buck and his hand has fallen away from where he was holding the towel and she almost dashed over to him, but he coughed and she knew he was still breathing so she had to keep going.
There was a beam trapping the last few desks and chairs standing in her way and she shouldered it, cringing and crying beneath its weight. There was a moment she thought she had it, but it shifted and fell back down on her shoulder, ripping a frustrated scream from her throat.
“Don’t you dare die on me, Buckley!” She yelled as she tried again, muscles straining under the weight and then finally, finally with a jangle of metal and tinkle of glass, she tipped it out of the way and made short work of the remaining obstacles.
Rushing back to Buck, she gently smacked at his cheeks to rouse him.
“You ready to get out of here?”
Buck squinted up at her. “Yes, please.”
They’d met a few of the B shift guys on their way out, and they took over Buck’s weight, getting him settled in the ambulance and on the way to the hospital in no time.
He had to have thirty seven stitches, which he was not happy about.
He was even less happy about the two weeks off of work due to basically not being able to bend in any direction in anything but slow motion or risk literally bursting the seam.
And, even though she and Karen and Denny had gone to see him several times during his recovery, when he walked into the station Hen greeted him with a hug like she hadn’t seen him in years.
“Glad to have you back, Buckaroo. We missed you.”
“Aw thanks, Hen. Same!” He said as he hugged her back tightly, lifting her just a bit in his enthusiasm.
They walked to the stairs together, Hen's arm around his waist and his around her shoulder.
“How was your time off?” She asked as they headed up to the loft together.
“It was ok, but—“ he glanced around, making sure she was the only one who could hear him. “Eddie is the biggest mother hen on the face of the planet. He’s worse than you, Athena and Bobby combined. I thought he was literally going encase me in bubble wrap or something.”
“Yeah,” she laughed, gently poking him in the shoulder, “don’t think he didn’t bring it up to us and we didn’t try and figure out a way to do it. In the end, we thought the danger of you suffocating yourself in it outweighed the protection it might give.”
Buck pouted down at her as they went to get their morning coffee. “You guys really have no faith in me, do you?”
“We have all the faith in the world…that you’re the biggest danger-magnet on the face of the planet.”
This statement was met with a chorus of agreement from the rest of the 118 that Buck just could not argue with.