Mixed Blood

Chapter 12

The site of the Tahoe Organization facility was almost unrecognizable to Rhia. The lumber mill used to disguise the above-ground opening had been swept over by the wildfires, leaving a forest of dead trees and a carpet of ash. Smoke still hung in the air, though the fires were no longer anywhere near the site.

Fires were unfortunately not an uncommon occurrence for California, and Rhia had seen just how destructive they could be in the years she worked as a paramedic. Her very first experience with the Shock Trauma Air Rescue Service teams had been during an international effort to fight what was, at the time, the worst wildfires in California history. Firefighters, fire suppression specialists, EMTs, and paramedics, just to name a few of the volunteers that came down from Canada and up from Australia, New Zealand, and Mexico.

Rhia, on top of her desperate fear of heights and flying, had just been saddled with a brand new EMT to train. It was the rookie's very first week on the job, and for that reason specifically, she specifically requested an assignment to ground support or held back to assist with triage. The last thing she needed was for him to freeze up or panic if they got caught in a burn-over.

So how she and Ian had been paired up with the STARS was beyond her.

She had nothing to say about the trauma nurse or advanced care paramedic. They were professional, knowledgeable, and had the same dark humor she did when they weren't working on a patient. They didn't get in her way while teaching and let Ian make mistakes until it put the patient at risk, and then weren't afraid to stop him.

No, her problem wasn't with the medical staff. Her problem was with the pilots. With a minimum of five hundred hours in the air needed just to be interviewed, the two pilots on that team had a combined total of thirty thousand hours of flight time and both had spent their entire careers with STARS. They did things Rhia didn't even know were possible in a helicopter. Things she still didn't understand now.

She asked Nekros about it once. He'd laughed and told her that the worst thing for a newly awakened flier was to look at helicopters. Planes, dragons and kin, and other flying creatures relied on aerodynamics and a delicate balance of speed, strength, and weight distribution. Helicopters, on the other hand, did not fly at all; they beat the air into submission.

Those pilots scared her for life. Poor Ian, who once thought he'd ended up with a cool, confident, and competent mentor, was left second-guessing his career choice. Somehow, out of pure luck, he hadn't lost total respect for her. They'd become best friends. Until...

Rhia shook her head and turned her back on the destruction. Thinking about Ian was a waste of time. Nathan, his boyfriend, had made it clear that neither of them wanted anything to do with her. If that ever changed, it would be up to them to contact her through the Counsel. They put their boundaries in place. All she could do was respect them.

The only thing that hadn't been burned away was the solid concrete elevator shaft. The elevator itself had been removed, as it had been damaged beyond repair, but the shaft was solid and safe—in theory—to descend by rope. Subconsciously, she tugged at her own harness and waited for turn. Logically, she knew she would probably survive falling straight down. But that was the problem with phobias. They weren't always rational.

"You don't have to come down with us," Bastian said gently from his place on a nearby rock. He, too, was in his harness and waiting for his turn on the ropes once Atticus and one of his computer techs had landed safely. "We can tell you what we find down there."

"I'm okay," she lied and masked it with a smirk. "Are you sure you want to go down there? You think your leg can handle it?"

"Respect your elders, young lady," he mocked through a puff of smoke and smacked her ankle with his cane.