Held by a string, Dane found herself in the dark plane again, suited up and gazing down through the slight windows, glimpsing the hungry fires miles below. The confinement, she told herself, was allowed only temporarily. That was the only way she’d make it through. The convincing was much like the running when one had no stamina left to go on. Only five more minutes. You can endure any hard task when you know how long it will take, when you have the knowledge it’s only temporary. Only this time it was different. Much different. This time it was a forest of concrete buildings below them. The flight had lasted a few hours and the drone of the plane had most of them falling asleep just after takeoff, like a bunch of newborns in a car seat, except for Dane. She watched Cal’s head bob to the side of his shoulder. She watched the drool strings deploy to his coat below and when Tuck caught her watching Cal, he made that same undeniable eye contact again with a slow shake of his head subtly, but without a doubt, no. His message loud and clear. Whatever you’re thinking, don’t do this thing, the look said.
Respecting Tuck was easy. He was an honorable man. But Dane no longer took orders from honorable men, or otherwise. Dane Talbot didn’t take orders. She just allowed others to tell her what to do for a limited time. Dane Talbot looked for distractions now…to get even. To get back at those that had done her wrong. And this…was just practice. Her motives, at the moment, were pest control and nothing more. She couldn’t leave Cal in place, not after what he’d done to Rebecca and not after the failed and broken system put him back in their midst. No, Cal had to go before she could leave. No one else would get justice for Rebecca or for the other women he’d likely prey upon in the future or those he’d created nightmares for in the past. No one, not even Matthew, had the strength to do what needed doing.
Filing out of the plane, the wind whipped at her clothing, carrying a burning scent burrowing deep into the fibers. Only this burning odor was different than what they were used to with forest fires. This one smelled more like burning oil, burning old mattresses, burning flesh and despair. She kept trying to huff it out of the lining of her nose and throat, to no avail. It wasn’t a pleasant smell like the burning of a forest of pine or cypress. This was something you wanted off you quickly. Off your skin. Out of your hair and yet, in an instant she’d dive into the acrid smoke, gliding through the misery of the failed concrete forest of man. Down between the buildings where the term light at the end of the tunnel took on a whole new meaning.
Surviving this city, any city, was just that…survival, especially when it was on fire and there existed no route of escape.
Landing with a thud between the buildings, as her predecessor had before her, she ran forward a few steps to let the chute glide down behind her and quickly unclasped her gear, automatically going into her routine after landing.
“Dane!” Matthew called back to her. “You’re over here with us.”
After packing up, she ran with her gear jostling against her frame. They held their Pulaski axes for chopping at closed doors and debris this time, not cutting lines on a forest floor. This was different, but they were also armed with wrenches and hoses sent down before them. They quickly linked up to hydrants or what few water trucks made it through, yelled out commands and started. More teams arrived behind them and soon all she saw were firefighters in action, with guards watching their backs.
“How’s that working out?” she yelled to Matthew with a tilt of her head at the assembly of men clad in camo holding guns.
“Hell if I know. I’m trying to pretend we don’t need them,” he yelled back over the din.
She and Matthew worked well as a team. This time they had four others along with them, including Owen. Matthew was the team lead even though Dane could do the job. She didn’t want the job as leader. She had no desire to give orders and if anyone came up with that idea, she’d stepped back into the crowd. She was capable…she just didn’t want the responsibility. Existing in a useful setting was her only purpose…not climbing the ranks—that she was happy to leave to the others.
When she had a quick second, Dane looked around her. She searched for Tuck. Where Tuck was, Cal too should be nearby, but Matthew caught her and shook his head.
Why was everyone always telling her no? Didn’t they understand she had to do this thing? No one else was going to do what needed to be done.
As if he read her mind and understood, Matthew gave her a sympathetic look and mouthed, “Not yet.”
Instead, she returned her attention back to the task at hand. They couldn’t afford diverted attention soon. She knew this. There was chaos all around them. They’d hooked up to the nearby fire hydrant and fought the flames on the first floor of what used to be a department store. The walls protested and groaned out as if in pain while the flames licked farther up, ruthlessly spreading.
“Hurry up!”
Where they worked in silence, as a team in the lit forest, here they were out of their preferred environment. They were all trained in structure fires before they were ever allowed to become smokejumpers but being suddenly thrust into an enclosure with walls once again took away the freedom of fighting a fire on their own terms. Suddenly walls were in a given space. Stairs. The oxygen itself was more limited, without a breeze through the trees or an extra place to run from the flames.