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They were headed out to a call at a warehouse. Somehow Blue had wound up sitting directly opposite Ryan in the back of the truck.
Ryan’s head was turned, looking out the window, but he could feel Blue gaze looking at him. He continued to ignore him, however.
He felt Blue tap his knee into his, but he still continued to ignore the other man. Despite everything, no one said that he had to like the guy. Only to play nice with him.
Six more hours to go, he told himself. Then he would have forty eight hours off. Forty eight hours to deal with the rest of the mess his life had become.
They pulled up outside of an old warehouse that, judging from the outside, should have been shut down and locked up years ago. From the windows near the top of the building, they could see smoke billowing out and bright orange flames inside.
Once they all got out of the truck, Don started giving them all orders, pairing them up, making a quick game plan to go inside and rescue the group of workers who were reported to be in one of the breakrooms in the back of the warehouse.
“Blue, you’re with Ryan!” Don called out. And even though Ryan knew that’s what his dad was going to say, what he had said every shift they were both working, he was still annoyed. But not annoyed to say anything about it. He was the Lieutenant, and Blue wasn’t even a probationary firefighter yet. It only made sense for him to be standing next to one of the most experienced and knowledgeable people on the scene.
They went into the warehouse, Ryan carrying the hose spout, Blue supporting the hose load behind him. They went left, the team behind them going right. Following the building layout, they should reach one corner in about thirty yards, where they would take a right turn. After another hundred yards, they’d reach the far wall on the opposite side of the building where they would make another right turn, and somewhere along that wall they would find the breakroom where all of the employees were currently located and waiting for them.
About a third of the way down the second wall, they heard someone yelling out to them. Blue looked over and saw a man on the ground, reaching his arm out to them. He was located right in the middle of a walkway between two high shelves.
He tapped Ryan on the shoulder. When Ryan turned his head, Blue pointed the man out. “There’s a guy over there!” he yelled out.
Ryan turned to point his body in the direction of him. “Let’s go get ‘im,” he said as he began to make his way to the downed man.
“Sir! Are you alright?!” Ryan yelled out to him as they approached. Getting closer, they saw that part of the shelving unit and a couple boxes had fallen on him and were keeping him pinned to the ground.
The man groaned, saying something that neither of them could make out.
Ryan crouched next to him. “Help me move these boxes,” he told Blue over his shoulder. Blue nodded and then went to the other side of the man, helping Ryan move one of the boxes. As they got to the last, and heaviest box, the shelving unit shifted.
The next thing they knew, it was toppling over.
Everything was coming down, and Blue could only look up at the failing structure and-
“Move,” Ryan’s voice yelled out as he felt the man shove him backwards harshly.
Blue tumbled, falling onto his back, the oxygen tank making him roll onto his side. Nothing had landed on him, but as he sat up, Blue saw that now Ryan and the man were on the ground, the shelving unit having collapsed on top of them. Blue quickly moved over, trying to lift the shelves off of Ryan himself, the thing hardly budged.
“Shit, shit,” Blue cursed. What was he supposed to do now? Fuck, he should have asked before this. Other than his first disastrous shift, this was the first time they were having him do something more than just watch over other people’s shoulders.
“R- Radio,” Ryan gasped out, looking up at him. Blue shook himself. Right, the radio, that’s why they had them.
Blue grabbed the radio on his shoulder, holding down the button. “Th- This is Blue,” he started. “We need help!”
It took a couple of seconds, then their father’s voice sounded back over the radio. “Blue? Where are you guys?”
“We’re on the west side of the building,” Blue said into the radio. “One of the shelves just fell over Ryan! We’re stuck!”
“Okay, sending Roberts and Johnson in right now to help you guys,” Don said.
Blue let out a sigh of relief at hearing that. “Copy that,” he said.
Roberts and Johnson. They were the team that had gone in at the same time as they did. If it meant they were going back in, that meant they must have found the group of people stuck in the breakroom and gotten them out. That was a good thing, Blue hoped.
Not even ten seconds after he heard that message however, Blue looked to the right, and oh fuck! The flames that had been mostly gathered around the center of the warehouse were spreading out, igniting some of the cardboard boxes located at the end of the aisle they were currently stuck in.
“The hose, Blue! The hose!” Ryan screamed out from where he was still pinned.
“Right,” Blue looked frantically around him, spotting the nozzle about two yards away from him. He crawled over to it quickly. He grabbed it, needing to maneuver himself around it to be able to point it at the flames. Turning on the water, Blue lost his balance and was nearly blown back by the recoil, which was so much stronger holding it by himself rather than when he was paired with someone else during their practice runs at the station.
“Your leg Blue! Brace your leg around it!” Ryan yelled out, directing him. And yeah, that was right, what Ryan had been harping at him to do each time they ran drills using the hose. Blue wrapped a leg around the hose, nearly sitting on it before turning it on again. This time it was more controlled. Blue was able to back the fire past the end of the aisle they were in.
After what felt like forever, Blue finally saw the familiar silhouette of two firefighters coming up behind him. It felt like a Godsend. Finally, some help.
“What happened to you guys?” the man Blue recognized as Johnson asked.
Blue pointed at the civilian who was now lying right next to Ryan. “We were trying to get him out when this whole thing fell.”
“Let’s get them out,” Johnson said as he stood in front of the fallen shelves, his back to them. He motioned for Blue to stand next to him. “Roberts, you good with pulling them out?” he asked.
Roberts nodded as he squatted down in front of the civilian, grabbing the man’s hands. He nodded at Johnson that he was ready to go.
“On the count of three. One… Two… Three,” Johnson counted. He and Blue both grunted as they lifted the structure, and boy was it heavy. Roberts was only able to just pull the civilian out from under it as Blue and Johnson lost their grip, sending the large shelving structure back onto Ryan.
Ryan screamed out as it fell on him.
“Come on! Again!” Blue yelled, as they tried to lift it again a second time.
The shelving lifted, and almost immediately, Ryan was screaming out in pain. Blood curdling screams.
Roberts was able to quickly pull Ryan free, and once he was a safe enough distance away, Blue and Johnson dropped the shelving structure. Now that both of the men were out of it, they could get out of here.
“Can you walk?” Blue heard Johnson asking Ryan as Roberts helped the other man stand up.
“No,” Ryan said. “My leg’s all fucked up.”
“Blue help me get ‘im up,” Johnson said, and Blue quickly went over to the side of Ryan opposite Johnson. They each grabbed a shoulder and helped Ryan stand up, then all five of the men made their way out of the building as fast as possible. It wasn’t lost on any of them how badly Ryan was favoring his right leg their entire way out of there.
Once outside, they all quickly brought the injured civilian and firefighter to the group of paramedics just past the firetrucks. Now that everyone was out of there, the trucks could blast their water out at the building.
They sat Ryan down on the rear bumper of an ambulance, Taylor walking over as they took their masks off.
“Ryan? Where’re you hurt?” she asked.
“Leg,” Ryan gasped out, panting slightly as he tried to regain his breath.
“One of those shelves fell on ‘im,” Blue added.
“Let’s get you on a gurney and some of that gear off,” Taylor said as she climbed into the back of the ambulance.
Blue helped Ryan get on board and onto the gurney sitting in the middle of it. Getting the gear off of Ryan was a lot easier said than done. Everything that involved moving or touching his right leg made Ryan feel like he needed to scream. He was doing all he could to hold it back though.
Once Taylor could see the skin of his shin, both her and Blue’s eyes widened in shock. “Yeah, that’s broken,” Taylor said. “I don’t even need an x-ray to say that.”
“What?” Ryan said as he looked down at his leg. “Shit.”
The bone hadn’t broken through the skin yet, but only barely. They could already see blood pooling below the surface of his skin, it looked almost as if he had a second knee based on the way his shin was bent at an angle. It was almost definite that Ryan was going to need surgery, possibly multiple, and had a long road to recovery ahead of him.
They quickly got out of there after that. Once Taylor was sure that Ryan wasn’t in any position of keeling over or bleeding out before she got him to the hospital. Blue rode in the back with him. Things were still awkward between the two, but for some reason, it felt slightly better.
Or maybe Blue was just reading things that weren’t there.
Once at the hospital, the medical staff quickly brought Ryan back into the Emergency Room, straight into getting X-rays on his leg.
Blue and Taylor were left at the front.
“How about you go find some seats in the waiting room?” Taylor asked Blue. “The others will get here once things are tied up at the scene. I need to move the ambo.”
“Y- yeah,” Blue nodded. They split up after that, Blue headed down the short hall from the ambulance entrance to the waiting room of the ER. Surprisingly, despite it being a Saturday night, the place didn’t look super crowded. He easily found a small corner with a couple of empty seats.
Taylor was back and sitting next to him less than five minutes later. “I didn’t ask you before,” she said. “But how are you doing? You get hurt?”
“I’m alright,” Blue said. “No injuries, well… maybe I’ll have some bruises tomorrow.”
Taylor smiled at him upon hearing that.
About another half hour later, Don and some of the others arrived at the same time a doctor came out with news about Ryan. They had needed to take him straight back into surgery, which came as a surprise to no one really.
Another three hours later, the doctor came back out saying the surgery was complete. Ryan was the new owner of three titanium screws and a plate in his leg. When they were eventually taken to Ryan’s room as he was taken out of recovery, Ryan was just starting to wake up fully. His right leg was wrapped in a cast from his toes to just above his knee.
Ryan was looking around at all of them, slowly blinking his eyes, still clearly out of it. “You guys didn’t have to come here,” he said, his voice heavily slurred.
Don shook his head as he walked up to Ryan’s bedside and stood next to him. “I think you should know by now that that’s not how we do things,” he said.
Ryan merely smiled at him as he was still struggling to keep his eyes open. “Yeah… I guess.”
It wasn't long after that when Blythe and Sam came to the room, both of them hugging him tightly in relief that he was alive. Blue stood off to the side with the others. He hadn’t spent enough time around either woman to know exactly how to be around them, especially Blythe.
As things started winding down knowing that Ryan would be alright sans broken leg, the crew went back to the station. Sam had needed to go to the hospital that she worked at across town for her shift starting that morning, and Blythe had gone to their house to grab some things knowing that at least her or Don would be with Ryan until he was discharged.
It was only Ryan, Don, and Blue left in there.
“Is stuff like this normal?” Blue felt the sudden need to ask.
“Things like what?” Ryan asked.
“Well you got a broken leg now,” Blue said, pointing at Ryan’s leg. Then he turned his finger to Don. “And last month you got struck by lightning. I know the job’s dangerous and everything, but is this normal?”
Don laughed, understanding Blue's question. “Only in our family,” he said. And that got a laugh from both Ryan and Blue.