The Bravest

IV

Dust drifted down from the ceiling, landing on the helmets of a dozen silent, shocked firefighters. Michael moved his head slowly, his eyes adjusting to the dimmer light, photo-luminescent markings in the stairwell glowing to life, originally installed after the 1993 bombing of the tower, there now in case of the lights going out. They cast the dark stairwell in an eerie glow.

"Everyone okay?" Doughtman whispered, breaking the stillness, as if any louder pitch might send the building shaking again. There were nods around, acknowledgements, the volume slowly rising again, returning to normal - as normal as things could be right now.

"What the fuck happened?" someone repeated, Marello.

Michael felt someone moving up closer to him, looked quickly, Clay, dust swirling around his head. The man's eyes were wide, and Michael couldn't help seeing the youthfulness in them. Clay had always hated that. Like Doughtman and Michael, Michael had met Clay when the man was a probationary firefighter in Manhattan, the period of time before a firefighter is sworn in as a full fledged member of a company. Michael had already been sworn in for two years by that time, Clay that much younger than him, but to Clay it had always felt like more. Of course, Michael hadn't helped by calling him kid a few times. Now, with Michael approaching his thirty-second birthday, age should've mattered even less, but every now and then Michael could feel the youth in Clay.

Michael didn't know what to say now, patted his friend on the shoulder. In front of him, Doughtman had moved to a knee, was messing with his radio. Michael heard a burst of static now, voices, Doughtman working quickly to clear up the signal. In a few seconds, the static slackened off, the voices coming in now.

"This is Battalion Chief Brown. The South Tower has collapsed. I repeat, the South Tower is gone. All firefighters need to begin evacuating the North Tower. The building is unsafe and is liable to come down too. All firefighters must evacuate the North Tower..."

The voice faded back into static, but it made no difference, the message already clear, another faltering moment of shock. Michael felt like he couldn't breath, a stabbing pain through his whole body, the wave of thoughts. No. No no no no. The South Tower couldn't have fallen. It was impossible. The towers were marvels of engineering. A hundred and ten stories of steel, concrete, and glass. It was impossible for it to just... fall. They had stood proudly over the city for nearly thirty years. They were just as much a part of the city as anything else. The South Tower couldn't have fallen. And... the people. How many people had still been in the building? How many were gone? Oh Jesus, how many casualties?

Michael's brain wrapped around the chief's final words now, Evacuate the North Tower. Unsafe. Liable to come down too. No, the North Tower would not fall. Its base was strong. It was holding up now. They couldn't evacuate. There were people up in the higher floors. People who needed help. Michael's help. He couldn't just walk down because of sudden panic. Michael understood just as well as anyone that it was a horrific event that one tower had fallen. It must have been horrifying to witness it from the ground. Michael would not fault anyone for fear, panic. He felt panicky himself. But panic can blur thoughts. Make you say something that is not very factual, figments of wild imagination. Like saying the North Tower would come down because the South Tower had. The North Tower was strong. It would survive.

But Michael couldn't even believe himself anymore. Brown hadn't sounded panicky. Calm, weirdly composed. He understood what Michael didn't want too. The collapse of the South Tower released an enormous amount of energy, a lot of which was directed into the North Tower. Windows had shattered, supports compressed, the base of the tower shaken down to the core. The thousands of tons of debris crashing down must've hit the North Tower in God knows how many places, further weakening the tower. The North Tower could stay up. Or, just as easily, it could collapse. The only true precaution now would be getting out.