In Flames // 9-1-1 Fox (seasons 1-4)

twenty-nine

The office was a ghost town.

Mariana frowned as they entered the building, noticing that there wasn't a peep to be heard. The call was about a bunch of doctors falling unconscious so Bobby ordered them to suit up and look like a bunch of minions. A phone rang in the distance of the office, adding to the creepy feel.

"What are we thinking, a gas leak?" Chimney asked.

"Could be some pathogen," Hen added. "World's a crazy place these days."

"Negative for combustibles for now. Masks stay on for the duration," Bobby ordered.

"Where is everyone? It's too quiet," Buck commented as they walked in.

"A little too Children of the Corn for you, Buck? Last time we watched a horror movie you refused to sleep alone," Mari sang.

"Really?" Chimney snorted.

"I had to practically swaddle him in blankets and sing him to sleep."

They turned a corner and headed down the hall towards the front desk. "Got one right here," Eddie announced. Mariana quickly joined him next to the desk attendant, pressing her fingers against the woman's wrist.

"We've got a pulse," she said.

A woman started screaming for help and so the others kept going, leaving Mari and Eddie to help the woman. "We need fresh oxygen. I'm guessing it's a gas leak."

"I'll go grab a tank and a mask." He was out and back in less than a minute. After setting the woman up with some oxygen, they moved onto the next room where three people were sprawled out on the ground.

"We're gonna need some more oxygen," she sighed.

"Eddie, Mari, you copy?" Bobby asked over the radio.

"Yeah, Cap."

"What's your status?"

"Found a couple more patients in the back. Also stable."

"I'm gonna send Chim your way. You three see if you can locate the tank supply room. You turn anything off that's got a knob or a valve in this place."

They met with Chimney in the hall just as Bobby announced that there was supposedly construction going on too. "Bingo," Mari muttered as they found the tarp. Construction workers were strewn across the room. Mariana immediately gravitated towards the guy slumped over the table with Chimney.

"Unconscious with a thready pulse," Mariana hummed to herself.

"This guy won't budge," Chim added. She crouched down to see under the table and immediately raised her hand to indicate he should stop trying to move him.

"Cap, found our leak," Eddie announced. "Plugging the leak now."

"Eddie, I'm gonna need some tools over here."

"Saws? Jaws? What do you need."

"A wrench."

It took them at least fifteen minutes to unhinge the saw from its hold and carry the guy onto the gurney. Mariana unzipped her hood and pushed it down so she could breathe properly. Eddie did the same, his normally perfectly coiffed hair falling across his forehead. As they pushed the gurney down the hall, she tilted her head to the side and studied him.

"What?" he asked.

"You look like Chris after a nap," she teased. He rolled his eyes in response as they walked the gurney towards the ambulance.

"Critical! Make way," Eddie called as they passed Hen and Buck. They loaded the guy into the back of the ambo and slid in, letting Chimney take over as the driver. They worked silently but in perfect sync, passing equipment back and forth as they set up machines for vitals and stabilized the saw.