THE WAREHOUSE FIRE in Courage Bay occurred on a Tuesday afternoon in late August. It was seventy-eight degrees, and sunny, with no clouds in the blue California sky.
Just before the call came, Shannon O’Shea was sweating up a storm, but not from basking in the sun. She was flat on her back, using the bench press machine in the workout room at the Jefferson Avenue Firehouse. She’d recently upped the weights from 140 to 150, and doing ten reps three times was challenging her to the limit when the alarm, like an insistent doorbell, resounded through the hall.
The dispatcher’s voice came on. “Engine One, Rescue One, Ladder One. First alarm to warehouse fire, State Street and Twenty-third.” There was a ten-second break, and then the alarm was repeated.
Shannon hurried out to the bay. She pulled her turnout gear over her sweat clothes and climbed on the truck with the rest of her crew, heart pumping and adrenaline soaring. She’d completed her probationary year eighteen months ago, but the feeling she’d had when she’d gone to her very first fire was the same one she had now—a little apprehensive, more than a little pumped, eager to do her job.
Fire was the enemy, speed was of the essence and small mistakes could be deadly. As a firefighter, those facts ruled her working life.
The sounds were familiar as the vehicle pulled out of Bay One and gained speed. There was the wail of the siren, the honk of the air horn at intersections and the low-keyed comments of the men. Louie Chapa, a five-year veteran, was behind the wheel, and as he neared their location, Shannon could see black smoke coming from the roof of a dilapidated warehouse.
While some of the crew began to stretch a line from the pumper, Shannon took a long and careful look at the building, as she’d been taught at the academy. Size up the building, size up the construction, size up the means of escape.
This one was big and rambling, two stories, a combination of wood and brick, very few windows. From where the truck was parked, she could see only one set of double doors. There must be a larger loading bay at the side or back.
“O’Shea, you go in with Lucas—place is supposed to be empty, but there could well be vagrants camping in there,” Chief Dan Egan said, and Shannon’s heart thumped with excitement.
It wasn’t that long since she’d been a rookie on the pumper, only assigned to the nozzle after the fire was practically out. When she was brand-new, her crew had taken care of her. Now she was a seasoned veteran looking out for other rookies, like Lucas Ferrintino.
She’d gone from a six-month assignment on the engine to her present, prized assignment as a truckie. Truckies were in charge of forcible entry, using sledgehammers and axes to burst through steel doors. They worked with the ladders, rescuing people trapped in high places. They climbed on roofs and broke windows for ventilation, and most of all, they did search and rescue. Being a truckie was a comment on her superb strength and high level of physical conditioning. She was proud to be considered worthy.
She grabbed her tools, and she and Lucas went inside the building, following the guys stretching the line.
Stay low. Heat and smoke rise. That was one of the first lessons drummed into a firefighter’s brain. Shannon didn’t have to consciously think about crouching as low as she could. After a few years on the job, it was as natural as breathing. Stay low, you go, stay high, you die was the mantra instilled into a trainee’s nervous system. She motioned with her hands to Lucas, reminding him.
Most of the flooring and many of the joists inside the building were made of wood. The support system for the second story was massive wooden beams. The place was cavernous, and at first Shannon couldn’t detect much indication of fire. But the farther she advanced, the thicker the smoke became, descending from the upper floor in slow, steady billows until it was like a black cloud surrounding her.
She dropped to the floor and secured her face piece, turning on her self-contained breathing apparatus. She had twenty minutes worth of air, as long as she breathed properly and didn’t hyperventilate. She’d done that a couple of times as a rookie, but she’d learned, the way all novices did, to control her breath and conserve her air supply.
It was the noise she was aware of, even more than the heat. Roaring and strange whispering sounds came from all around her, the eerie madness of the archenemy. And beneath those noises she heard another sound, long and drawn out, faraway, like someone wailing, crying out with pain. She listened hard, trying to figure out where it was coming from.
Someone’s alive in here.
She signaled Lucas. He heard it, too. It was impossible to localize. She pointed, indicating that she was heading in one direction and he should go in the other, each of them following one of the hose lines the engine crew was operating. Following a hose into a building meant that you could turn and follow it out again.
They parted, sweeping their flashlights in wide arcs, and within moments Lucas was out of Shannon’s sight. The cries seemed to be coming from her right, and she crab-walked in that direction, still following the line, using her flashlight to illuminate the space ahead of her.
The men on the hose were pumping water into the flames, and smoke was thick and oily all around her. Off to her left, ceiling beams were catching on fire, crackling and roaring in an increasing cacophony of sound. The place was going up surprisingly fast, but she could still hear the disturbing cries. She veered again, trying to determine where they were coming from.
Using her light to peer around, she realized that she was alone now, without the reassurance of the hose to lead her back out. She turned, about to retreat, but again she heard the sound. It was a whimpering, whining plea for help. She had to find whoever it was, and she had to do it quickly. Those overhead beams were going to start crashing down at any moment.
Shannon struggled through the dense smoke toward where she thought the sound was coming from. Rounding a corner, she’d reached another section of the warehouse. The smoke wasn’t quite as thick here, and although there were flames, they were off in the distance. She turned her head from one side to the other, searching the floor. The cries came from nearby.
Ahead of her, a beam had already fallen, cracking in half, and underneath it, her light picked out a black dog, a Lab. He was pinned by one hind leg, and scrabbling frantically at the wooden floor with his front paws, desperately trying to drag himself free. He was alternately yipping, howling and coughing from the smoke. His big, soft eyes were frantic with pain and terror, and when he spotted Shannon, he began to bark and whine, as if to say, Here I am, please, please, don’t leave me.
“Hey, boy, easy now. Calm down. I’ll get you loose…”
Shannon got to her feet, slid her gloved hands under the timber and bent her knees. She grunted and strained, putting her considerable strength into raising the heavy beam and releasing the dog, but the wood was incredibly heavy. She wished with all her heart that she had one of the K-12 saws, but they were back on the truck. No time to go and get one.
She tried again, using the strength in her legs to lever the weight. It wouldn’t budge at first, and then slowly, slowly, it moved, but she sank to her knees with the strain, almost losing her grip. With one final desperate shove, using her shoulder, she heaved against the timber, and sent it toppling.
She fell forward—hard—from the momentum, but at least the dog was free. The moment he felt the weight lift from his body, he scrambled toward her, dragging his crushed hind leg, barking and choking from the smoke.
“Poor baby.” Shannon’s heart was racing and she was puffing hard from the effort. She wondered for an instant how much air she had left. The smoke was growing denser by the minute.
“Gotta get us out of here fast, fella,” she muttered. A rapid, horrified glance around told her that the fire had accelerated, and above her head, flames were leaping from one wooden beam to the next in a macabre, gleeful dance.
“Let’s go. C’mere, dog.” Shannon grunted, lifting the animal in her arms. Still crouched down, she scuttled back in the direction she thought she’d come. Her equipment weighed sixty-eight pounds. The dog was easily another sixty. Skinny as he was, he was big-boned and rangy, but at least he didn’t resist.
She did her best not to bump his damaged hind leg—she wondered for an instant if he’d bite—but he only yelped in agony as she hoisted his forepaws farther over one shoulder, trying to support his broken limb and steady him with one hand, while still hanging on to her flashlight with the other.
“Now, where—oh darn, oh Lordy—”
A wall of flames sent her staggering backward. She looked in the other direction, but roiling smoke made it impossible to see. The powerful beam from her flashlight barely penetrated the darkness, and the noise of the fire had grown into a rushing, eerie roar that sounded at times like some demon chortling with glee.
We’re in trouble here, pooch. I don’t know where the lousy line is anymore. I came around some sort of doorway…
Shannon felt panic begin to nip at her brain, and resolutely shoved it away. A trapped firefighter who panics is going to die. There was a way out of this—there had to be. She just had to find it. She turned in a circle, searching, and now she was also silently praying.
Dear God, help us. Get us out of here, please show us the way…
But the flames roared closer.
Please, God, we need a miracle here…
At that moment a nearby beam gave an ominous creaking groan as fire snaked up its length. In another few moments, it would collapse, and unless she got out of the way, it would crush her and the dog beneath it.
She pulled her mask away.
“Hello, anybody there?”
She hollered again, as loud as she could, but there was no answer.
Heat seemed to envelop her on every side, and as she clamped the mask on again, she imagined that her air was running out. The stink of smoke filled her nostrils, and she gagged and choked. The terrible, awesome sound of the flames built into a crescendo.
Of all the fires she’d been on, was she now about to die in a stupid vacant warehouse, rescuing a dog?
Don’t panic. She tried to calm herself, to stay in control and figure out what she ought to do next. But instinct and reason both told her she was trapped, that she and the poor animal in her arms were going to die together.
And then from the wall of flames a shape appeared, a huge form in a silver outfit that enveloped the entire body of whoever—whatever—was inside it.
Shannon gaped, certain that the smoke had gotten to her. She knew she was hallucinating, because ordinary firemen just weren’t issued the mega-expensive silver suits.
Maybe this was the angel of death?