Cassie woke up with a yelp. She had the overwhelming urge to run. At first she did not recognize her surroundings. Her heart was racing. Blood pounded so loudly in her ears that she did not hear anything else. Suddenly the light blasted to life, nearly blinding her.

“You okay?” Chet demanded.

She still felt confused. She realized that she was in the spare room at Chet’s townhouse but what was she doing there?

“You okay?” Chet repeated. The concern in his sleepy voice was evident.

“What’s going on?” she asked fighting down the strange terror she could not understand. “What am I doing here?”

“You were in an accident in an ambulance,” he explained nervously. It did not sound like this was the first time he’d explained it to her.

“I - I don’t remember.” She put her hand to her head as if trying to force the memory. “Pidge? Is Pidge okay?”

“She’s fine. She wasn’t with you. The baby is okay too.”

“What baby?”

“The one you were transporting. The ambulance was broadsided. You guys were trapped but luckily the County called in Station 51 and we got you right out. Pronto.” He sat on the side of the bed and pushed a long wisp of her unruly auburn hair out of her face.

“I don’t remember any of this. Why don’t I remember?”

“Doctor Brackett said you had a concussion. They wanted you to stay at Rampart but you had a typical bratty hissy fit so they finally reneged as long as you stayed here and had medical supervision.”

“Medical supervision?” She was confused.

“Yeah. Thanks to you, I have Gage sleeping on my couch.”

“Why?”

“To make sure you’re all right,” another voice said from the doorway. It was Johnny Gage one of the paramedics from Chet’s station.

“I - I don’t remember any of this.”

The fright in her voice was evident. Chet and Johnny exchanged worried glances.

“Well short term memory loss is pretty common with a concussion,” Johnny smiled. “Let me take a look at your eyes. I have to report back to Brackett and he’s a lot harder on paramedics who don’t call him Dr Gorgeous. You do remember that, don’t you?”

“He tries not to blush,” she said stonily.

“Tries and fails,” Johnny agreed. He flashed his pen light in her eyes. He took a complete set of vitals. She didn’t put up any fight. This was not like her. Johnny hoped that Chet would fail to notice. Her pupils reacted normally but the Cassie Kelly spunk was not there.

“Somebody died,” she stated flatly.

Chet and Johnny exchanged worried glances again. Johnny decided to tell her the truth. If it were him, he’d want to be told the truth. “The ambulance was hit by a drunk driver. He and his passenger were killed on impact. The ambulance attendant who was on that side of the vehicle died at Rampart. The driver is in serious condition but he’s holding his own.”

“I didn’t know them. I remember that much. Tell me about the accident. Maybe it will help me remember. I don’t like having a hole in my memory.”

“Okay. From what we found out later, you and Pidge had rolled on a 'baby not breathing' call but you were able to establish an airway for the baby and had him on O² and into an incubator and you were riding into Rampart with him,” Johnny told her.

“It was the new neonatal ambulance. That’s why we didn’t know the attendants,” Cassie recalled.

“That’s right. You went with the baby and Pidge waited with the mother till the baby’s father got there so he could drive her into Rampart.”

“The mother was blind.”

“Yes she was. Do you remember anything else?”

“Everything was normal enough then there was this huge bang and everything started flying around. I tried to get to the baby but I couldn’t seem to get up. I felt like I was flying, then falling. My head and neck really hurt and my hand was bleeding. I tried to get up but I was stuck then everything went black. It’s all fuzzy after that,” she admitted honestly.

“Then you do remember it all,” Johnny told her. “You were unconscious the rest of the time till you got to Rampart.”

“That’s the part I don’t remember at all -- after the accident.”

“Well, you missed quite a bit. Ol’ Chester B here put on quite a show. The Cap almost had to deck him to get him back in line.”

“Shut up, Gage,” Chet snarled. “He’s lying.”

“Nope. Scout’s honor. They threatened to sedate him. We were about to call in Animal Control with their big tranquilizer gun when ---”

“You’re getting much better at it,” Cassie interrupted him.

“Better at what?” Chet asked suspiciously.

“Handing you back your blarney. Now I’m wondering if Johnny had a wandering Irishman somewhere in his family tree. Maybe some lost Celtic princess--”

“Oh shut up. Both of you. It’s the middle of the night, you know,” Chet grouched.

“Those lessons you have been giving me are really paying off,” Johnny agreed.

“What lessons?” Chet demanded angrily.

They both just laughed at him and he knew he’d been set up. He was sure that Cassie was behind it. Gage wasn’t that bright. “Look, Brackett said you were supposed to rest. I suggest we all go back to bed and get some sleep.”

“Boy, what a crummy sleepover this is turning out to be,” Cassie complained.

“This isn’t a party. Come on, Gage, go back to the couch.” He herded Johnny toward the door. “Good night, Cassie.”

“Good night, John Boy, Good night, Chet-Brat.”

“So that’s what the B stands for,” Johnny teased as they walked away from the door. Chet did not respond. He didn’t seem to have even heard. He looked worried. “She’s okay, Chet.”

“No, she isn’t. I can tell. She’s too agreeable,” Chet said quietly.

Johnny had not heard anything he would have really called agreeable happen between the two Kellys but Chet knew her better than he did.

“Hey, Chet. We’re right here. We’re not going to let anything happen to her. She’s a tough kid. She’ll make it through this. They would have made her stay at Rampart if it was really serious. This type of thing just takes a little time to get over, is all.”

“I’m holding you to that, Gage,” Chet threatened as he went back into his bedroom.

Johnny headed back to the living room and Chet’s lumpy couch. Chet and Cassie fought like cats and dogs but they had a bond that he almost envied. He had no siblings so he knew he couldn’t know what that bond was really like. He imagined it was similar to the bond that partners feel for one another only deeper. He yawned as he climbed back into bed and decided to think about it some other time.

* * * * *

Johnny was awakened a few hours later by the sunlight streaming through Chet’s living room drapes. He tried to roll over and go back to sleep but it was no use. He was wide awake. He got up and got dressed. Before long he heard activity from the bedroom area. He went into the kitchen and decided to whip up some pancakes.

Soon both Chet and Cassie joined him. They had already been arguing. Johnny took that as a good sign.

“Whatcha makin’, Mom?” Cassie asked.

“World renowned John Gage flapjacks,” he told her with a flourish.

“World renowned, my eye,” Chet grumbled coming over to look at what Johnny was doing. “What? Just pancakes? There’s bacon in the fridge.”

“Well you can cook that in a different pan, if you want.”

“Gee thanks. This is my kitchen remember? Why dirty another pan? There’s room in that one.”

“Because some of us in this room don’t eat meat.”

“Oh for --”

“She needs to eat, Chet,” he hissed under his breath. “Besides, these will be so filling that you won’t need anything else.”

“Filling is right. As I recall, when you made these at the station we all felt like we had rocks in our guts. If we’d have gotten a run --”

Cassie had been digging dishes out of Chet’s cabinet. Suddenly the talk of a run made her remember the fear that she had felt last night when she remembered the accident. She closed her eyes and forced her fear to go away. It didn’t make any sense. How could something she barely even remembered have such a grip on her?

“Cass, you all right?” Chet was suddenly at her elbow.

The fear in his eyes was real. She hated it. She hated making him feel that way. She also hated the fact that he always felt so protective of her. She had spent her whole life trying to be treated like an equal. She wasn’t some helpless little girl. She didn’t need any protection. Why couldn’t he see that? She wanted to scream at him. She wanted to tell him he was smothering her.

“Cass?” he repeated.

“Sit down, Cassie,” Johnny took over. He took her elbow and steered her to one of the chairs. He was in full paramedic mode and checked her vitals and her eyes.

“Is she okay?” Chet’s voice rose three octaves.

“Maybe she should just sit here for a few minutes. You’re not dizzy, are you?”

“No more than usual. I’m okay --”

“No. You listen to Johnny. You sit there. I’ll set the table,” Chet insisted.

“Works every time,” she smirked. “If I had a dollar for every time I conned you into doing that for me.”

“Hardy har har,” Chet grumbled. He looked behind Johnny to the stove. Suddenly black smoke billowed up out of the frying pan. “Gage! You started a fire!!”

Johnny turned around “Oh shit!” He grabbed the cover for the frying pan and smothered the blaze before it could do any real damage.

“Johnny cakes flambe,” Cassie laughed. “How haute cuisine?”

“Gage! You’re an accident looking for a place to happen!” Chet yelled at him.

“Calm down, Chet. No harm done. The fire is out, see? I’ll just whip up another batch.”

“World renowned pancakes,” Chet muttered. “Renowned among arsonists maybe.” Chet would have gone on but the phone rang. He padded across the kitchen floor to answer it.

“Oh fine. Yeah. Everything’s goin' great. Gage just set my kitchen on fire!” It was the first of many phone calls. All of Station 18 and half of Station 51 called. As did Dixie McCall. By late afternoon, Cassie could stand it no longer. She insisted that she had to leave. It was Saturday night and she had plans. Johnny had been able to find nothing wrong with her so they had to let her go. Someone from Station 18 had dropped her car off at Chet’s and she was eager to be out of there. She was sure that Johnny and maybe even Chet had better things to do on a Saturday night than to babysit with her.

She found that she felt a little shaky as she pulled out into the busy traffic on the boulevard that ran past Chet’s place. She forced herself to relax. She was driving. She was in control. She was not blind in the back of some ambulance. She could handle it. Still, both her palms were sweaty and she was breathing a little heavily as she pulled into the lot at the dojo. She needed to get in there and work out. That’s all. She wanted to put all this behind her and just get on with things.

* * * * *

She walked into the station for her next shift. She was early. Naturally, Captain Tacy was even earlier. It appeared C shift was on a run. She went into the locker room to change. She was deep in thought about not much of anything.

“You all right, Kelly?”

She jumped and spun around in surprise. “Cap? I didn’t hear you.”

“No shit, Sherlock. Now answer the question.”

“Cap, I’m fine. Why won’t anyone believe me?” she complained.

“Maybe because it’s a lie.” Tacy said flatly.

“Cap, I’m perfectly fit for duty. I have a few stitches in my hand and a few bruises. No big deal. I had a meet yesterday. I won every match I was in. If I wasn’t all right, could I have done that?”

“There’s physically all right and there’s mentally all right,” the cap told her.

“Cap, when the hell have you known me to be mentally all right?”

“Ya got me there, Kelly,” Tacy laughed. “Still, I’m trusting the paramedic in you to come forward if you have any problems at all. We can’t endanger the public or each other just to keep someone’s ego intact. You get my drift?”

‘Drift? More like an avalanche,’ Cassie thought to herself.

“Don’t worry about that, Cap,” Pidge spoke up. “The paramedic in me is going to be watchin' her like a hawk.”

“Sheesh -- first Johnny Gage now you. At least, he’s good looking,” Cassie griped.

The rest of the shift began to file in and C-shift returned with the equipment. They got busy and Cassie hoped that everyone would just forget about the whole accident. After all, she had. Since C-shift had been on the run all night, they were low on supplies so Cassie and Pidge went in to Rampart to stock up.

“You know, if you watch my driving any more carefully, I’m going to swear you’re secretly working for the DMV,” Cassie complained.

“Now who’s being paranoid?” Pidge asked. She had noticed that Cassie seemed to be being a little more cautious than usual, not that she had ever thought she would complain about that. “Although, I am kind of glad to be riding on all four wheels for a change.”

“Yuck it up. I mean just because you’re getting on up there in years, doesn’t mean we all have to act like old ladies.”

Pidge refused to be baited. Cassie certainly was acting like her usual annoying self. Maybe she was right that her thick Kelly skull had protected her.

They walked into Rampart and approached the nurse’s station. Dixie was working on a chart but looked up when she heard them. “What are you doing here?” she accused.

Cassie and Pidge looked at each other in momentary confusion. “We need supplies and you guys got the best prices in town,” Cassie told her.

“What are you doing working today?”

“I’m not working. I’m here at Rampart goofing off,” she said with a false grin.

“You have 16 stitches in your hand, to say nothing of a mild concussion!”

“I’m keeping my hand dry and it’s not like I use my head all that much anyway,” Cassie explained, undaunted as she reached for a banana from the fruit bowl on the counter. She heard laughter behind her and turned around to see Johnny and Roy standing there. Where had they come from?

“So how did it go Friday night?” Dixie changed the subject now that she had them both there.

“Great,” Cassie said in a dreamy voice. “Johnny was very attentive. But Saturday morning is when he really lit my fire.” She sighed and batted her eyes at Johnny.

“Cassie!!!” Johnny snarled. He was blushing bright crimson as both Pidge and Dixie stared at him. Roy had heard about the whole event in great detail from a complaining Chet, including the near kitchen fire.

“It wasn’t like that at all. Chet was right there, for crying out loud! What are you trying to pull?” he accused Cassie.

Cassie just laughed and pointed to the elevator that Nurse Betty Gimbal was scrambling onto. Betty was the biggest gossip in the whole hospital. She had obviously been eavesdropping and she was the one that Cassie had put the show on for.

“Oh no! Do you realize what you have done?! This is going to be all over the hospital!” Johnny’s neck veins were now distended.

“I know and within the hour, Chet is going to have to be fielding phone calls for you at the station from nurses. Won’t that piss him off?”

“Ah...Ub.. Uh. You know, she’s right,” Johnny brightened. He could well score some dates from curious nurses and even if he didn’t, it would really piss Chet off.

“You know this is scary,” Roy suddenly shuddered. “They think alike.”

“The enemy of my enemy is my friend,” Cassie shrugged winking at Johnny.

He winked back. Let them just wonder. An ally against Chet was fine in his book.

“I think they're both crackpots,” Pidge stated flatly.

“Yeah but is the Department ready for two of them? I thought Johnny was the only one,” Roy sighed.

“The Department? The world’s not ready,” Pidge complained.

“Boy, Johnny, I hope we never get as old and set in our ways as those two,” Cassie remarked.

Just then the Handy Talkie Roy carried cracked to life sending Squad 51 on a run.

“Good-bye, Johnny,” Cassie said dramatically, catching a small cluster of nurses out of the corner of her eye. The grapevine was working fast.

“Good-bye, Cassie,” Johnny matched her tone for their benefit.

“Come on!” Roy grabbed his shirt and yanked him away. “You’d better not let Chet catch this act,” he muttered.

“You’re never happy unless you’re stirring things up!” Pidge said with exasperation. A glare from Dixie had sent the nurses on their way.

“Runs in the family,” Cassie shrugged, opening the drug box to see what supplies they needed.

Suddenly Dixie said, “Cassie, there’s some people who would like to see you.”

Cassie expected it was one of the doctors trying to check out her cut hand. The wound was minor and she was really getting sick of all the fuss. She had decided that she would just have to deal with the fact that there was a period of time that should could not remember. She just wanted to forget the whole thing. This was beginning to get more than a little annoying.

Pidge read her like a book. She could tell she was suddenly at the end of her somewhat short fuse. She poked her elbow into Cassie’s ribs before she could explode. As she expected, the whole of Cassie’s attention was now focused on her. She pointed over Cassie’s shoulder.

Cassie spun around. It was not a doctor behind her. It was a man and a woman carrying a baby. She had never laid eyes on them before.

“This is Cassie Kelly,” Dixie was saying to them.

“Well this little guy sure looks a lot better than last time we saw him,” Pidge cooed. “How’s he doing?”

“My wife and I want to thank you,” the man said. “You saved Lennie’s life.”

“I panicked when I picked him up from his nap and he wasn’t breathing,” the wife said nervously. “I - I just didn’t know what to do.”

“You did the right thing. You called us,” Pidge assured her.

“I was just so scared. And then when we got here and found out that the ambulance had been in an accident.....”

“But he was fine. Remember that, Katie. He was fine. We just wanted to see how you were doing,” the husband addressed Cassie.

“I’m okay. Just a little cut on my hand. I did worse damage to myself once when a glass I was washing broke,” Cassie smiled.

Dixie and Pidge could tell the smile was forced but the Thompsons did not know Cassie as they did and she was able to fool them. Dixie and Pidge continued to make small talk with the couple while Cassie packed the new supplies into the drug box.

The baby began to get fussy so the couple left, eager to get him home and feed him.

“Things were pretty grim around here that day. Pidge and I really had our hands full trying to keep the Thompsons calm. ‘Course, they were nothing compared to Chet,” Dixie laughed.

“So Johnny said. I don’t know why he has to act like such a horse’s ass,” Cassie muttered closing up the drug box.

“Hey, that’s a big brother’s job,” Dixie said in Chet’s defense.

“Nobody asked him to do it,” Cassie snarled angrily. “And I wish he’d just quit it. I don’t need a damn keeper.” With that she picked up the drug box and headed for the squad.

Dixie and Pidge exchanged curious glances. Pidge could think of no one on Earth who needed a keeper more than her partner. This strange behavior was lost on neither of them. “What’s with her?” Dix asked.

“I don’t know but I sure am goin' to find out,” Pidge vowed as she picked up the handy talkie and followed her partner. She wanted to be angry but she really felt more nervous than angry.

Cassie was sitting in the squad. Pidge climbed in too. “What the hell was that all about, girl?” she accused.

“I didn’t know them,” Cassie admitted in a small voice.

“Didn’t know who?”

“Those people. I don’t remember them at all. I’d swear I never saw them before.”

“Well, you probably never did see the man before. You saw the woman and the baby on the run right before the accident,” Pidge explained.

“I don’t remember,” Cassie spat slamming both hands against the steering wheel. “Dammit! I don’t remember them at all. I vaguely remember the accident but mostly everything is sketchy. Then the next thing I remember is waking up at Chet’s. I can’t remember a thing in between.”

“Well, you had a mild concussion. Short term memory loss ---”

“That’s what Johnny said. Sounded like bullshit when he said it too,” she muttered as she started up the engine.

“Well it isn’t bullshit. It’s medical fact. But it might be more than that.”

“What not just a concussion? That’s enough, thanks.”

“Well in 'Nam the doctors were putting a name to something they saw in a lot of the boys that had been injured. They were calling it Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. Memory loss and missing time were some of the symptoms.”

“How could I be stressed out about something I don’t even remember? That’s even more outlandish than claiming I have a brain injury, especially since you’re always saying I don’t have a brain in my head. Make up you mind, already. We’d better get back, if you’re done playing shrink, that is,” Cassie scoffed.

“Well there is another possibility,” Pidge offered. “Maybe it was the fact that you came face to face with your own mortality.”

“What?!!!” Cassie laughed.

“You seem to have this idea that you are indestructible. Maybe the Man upstairs is trying to tell you something.”

“The only man who had anything to do with this was the damn drunk who decided it was a good day to die and take a couple of people with him,” Cassie spat angrily.

Pidge didn’t press the matter any further. She actually thought it was more healthy for her partner to be upset about the accident rather than to act as if it had never happened.

* * * * *

When they got back to the station they found that Captain Tacy had a series of drills set up for them to go through. The physical activity calmed Cassie down and by lunch time her mood was back to normal.

Just as they sat down to eat lunch they got a run.

STATION 18 MULTIPLE INJURIES DANIEL WEBSTER HIGH SCHOOL 2224 CORONADO BLVD. CROSS STREET ARNOLD. 2-2-2-4 CORONADO BLVD. INFORMANT ADVISES USING ARNOLD STREET ENTRANCE. VICTIMS ARE ON THE FOOTBALL FIELD.

Captain Tacy acknowledged the run and they were off. The Engine followed the squad onto the football field. They expected to come upon injured ball players. The place looked like a war zone. There had obviously been some sort of brawl. But the uniforms the kids were wearing indicated that the combatants had been members of the band. It had taken the bandleader, three gym teachers and several other members of the faculty to break up the melee. The principal himself approached the cap to try and explain what had happened. The school nurse had all of the injured in one area. Cassie and Pidge made their way to them.

“It’s mostly bumps and bruises,” the exasperated nurse explained. “But this one is beyond me.” She pointed to three students who had become one with the help of a tuba. There was a girl’s foot stuck inside the hole where the sound was supposed to come out. The tuba was being worn by a rather pudgy boy. He was lying on ground the now mis-shapen tuba collapsed around him. The part of the tuba that went around him and had him trapped was also around another girl’s arm.

“Get us out! Get us out, I can’t breathe,” screamed the girl whose arm shared the tuba with the boy.

“You don’t breathe through your arm,” Cassie told her. “Now what the heck happened here?”

“How do you know I don’t have asthma?” the girl challenged.

“I don’t. But I know you’re not having an asthma attack. However, if you feel one coming on I can prepare you a nice shot of epinephrin.”

The girl just muttered under her breath so Cassie went on to check the other patients while Pidge went to check the blood pressure of the band leader.

“What’s your name?” she asked the boy.

“Roland Freeman,” he puffed.

“I’m Cassie,” she introduced herself as she checked to see if the tuba was restricting his breathing. “Do you have asthma?”

“No ma’am.”

“Hey knock off the ma’am stuff, huh?” Cassie smiled. “We may have to cut this off.”

“NOT WITH MY FOOT IN THERE!!!” the other girl shrilled.

“As long as you can breathe, Roland, let me work on getting ---”

“Patsy,” the girl sobbed, “Patsy Brill”

“--- getting Patsy out first.”

“Do you have to cut it? My mom’s gonna kill me,” Roland moaned. “This tuba cost a bundle.”

“Well it looks pretty well shot as it is,” Cassie said sympathetically.

“I suppose,” Roland muttered.

Cassie looked around for some help. The crew looked like they were spread pretty thin. Crenshaw was helping a kid get out of a base drum that had been pushed over his head. He wasn’t complaining a bit about the condition of his drum. A girl as chesty as Crenshaw giving him her undivided attention was something a skinny 15 year old thought he could only dream about.

Barb was helping a cheerleader whose sweater was caught on the slide of a slide trombone. Barb was the only one of the whole crew who would have had the patience to do that. Unraveling a sweater came pretty low on everyone else’s priority list. The cap was still talking to the principal. Vince Howard had arrived on the scene. Pidge was busy with the band leader who was looking decidedly pale. The nurse was helping her.

“Hey Tink,” Cassie called to the Engineer who looked around at the teenage carnage with disbelief. “I need some sort of prying tool here.”

Tink took in the situation then ran back to the engine. If anybody could figure this out Tink could.

One of the things Tink brought was an axe. This set off a panic among the victims until she explained that it was the handle she intended to use. She was able to bend the bowl of the tuba enough to free Patsy’s trapped foot.

Cassie checked it out while Tink used some tin snips to cut away enough of the rest of the tuba to free Roland and the snotty girl. The girl refused to let “stupid firemen” examine her arm. Roland was unhurt, at least he was until his mother heard about the tuba.

Patsy’s foot was bruised. The principal insisted that she, two boys with cuts that needed sutures and the band leader, all go into Rampart to be checked. They all piled into one ambulance. Pidge went with them since she was the one with the most cardiac training.

As the crew gathered up the equipment Cassie asked if anyone knew what the fight was about.

“Some sort of argument about a new song they were learning,” Barb explained.

“What was the song?” Tink asked.

“That’s the real kicker. The song was Give Peace A Chance,” Barb laughed.

* * * * *

They had just backed into the station when they got another call.

STATION 18. DIFFICULT BREATHING EMMANUEL FREEDOM CHURCH 1601 PORTER AVENUE 1-6-0-1 PORTER CROSS STREET WILMINGTON BLVD

Captain Tacy acknowledged the call from the Engine and they were off again. Pidge gave Cassie directions to the church. This was her church. They arrived within minutes. An elderly black man sat on the steps and a very nervous woman stood next to him. She saw the squad and engine pull up. “Hurry!” she yelled at them.

Pidge and Cassie grabbed their equipment and led the Engine crew through the iron gate up to the church steps. “Brother Williams,” Pidge said as she squatted in front of the older man. She knew that he had emphysema and he was struggling to catch his breath. She applied oxygen immediately.

“He was trying to mow the lawn. Those boys were supposed to do that this weekend but they never showed up. I am going to have to phone their mamas about this!”

“Now, Sister Sarah, boys have better things to do,” the old man puffed. “I should be able to mow this little bitsy bit of grass. Why there was a time....”

“Hush, Brother. Let Liz work here,” Sister Sarah was very worried about the old deacon.

“That mower is supposed to be self propelled but it just don’t work right these days. Kind of like my old bones,” the old man laughed.

While Pidge and Cassie worked on the old man, Tinker took a look at the mower. She was almost compulsive about fixing things. She spotted the problem right away and set about repairing it.

By the time they had the old man ready and convinced to go to Rampart, Tinker had the mower ship shape. Pidge rode into Rampart with him. Cassie followed in the squad. Captain Tacy had was in pensive mode and the others took turns finishing the lawn. Brother Williams had told them the church had a full schedule of events planned this week including a wedding and a pot luck supper. He had wanted the grounds to look their best. They had all fallen victim to the old man’s charm and, Tom Sawyer notwithstanding, they intended to do the lawn for him. They even joked about starting a lawn business on their days off.

* * * * *

When Cassie pulled the squad back into the station Captain Tacy called her into her office. She wondered what she had done now.

“Yeah, Cap?” she asked munching an apple she had snatched from Dixie’s fruit basket while waiting for Pidge.

“Sit down, Kelly.”

‘Uh oh that’s not a good sign,’ Cassie thought, as she sat on the arm of one of the wooden chairs in the cap’s office. They were just like the kind that was at the principal’s office in her high school. She found herself called in there quite a bit too, she remembered.

“Sit in the seat, if you don’t mind,” Cap said without looking up from the logbook she was going over.

Cassie shrugged and obeyed.

“I’ve been going over your log.”

Cassie wondered what she had spelled wrong in the log book.

“Two runs. Two trips to Rampart. Pigeon rode in with both patients. You aren’t developing a phobia about riding in ambulances, are you?”

“What?! Cap, that’s hogwash!”

“Is it?” the captain asked, leaning back in her seat. Her eyes bored into the young paramedic trying to ascertain the truth of the situation.

“Yes. The first time it was a cardiac case -- Pidge’s specialty. The second time it was someone who knew her. The old guy was more at ease with Pidge.”

“So, it was just a coincidence?”

“That’s right. That’s all it was.”

The cap studied her. She didn’t buy it at all. “Well, in that case, you won’t mind my insisting that the next ambulance ride is yours.”

“I don’t have any problem with that,” Cassie insisted although her voice did raise three octaves.

“Best thing to do when you’re tossed off a horse is to get right back on,” Tacy stated flatly.

A smart remark about ambulances not being drawn by horses anymore popped into Cassie’s head but she wisely kept it to herself. Imagine the cap thinking she was afraid to ride in an ambulance? She’d done it a million times. Besides, she wasn’t afraid of anything. She never had been and she wasn’t about to start now.

“You read me, Kelly?”

“Loud and clear, Cap,” she said but added under her breath, “but you’ve got this all wrong.”

“Suppose you prove that. Next run,” Tacy said returning her attention to the logbook. “Oh and, Kelly, we don’t refer to victims as ‘the snotty girl’. You got that?”

“Yes, Cap,” Cassie sighed. She hadn’t thought that one would get by the cap anyway.

* * * * *

The next call was a fire at a gas station. An attendant learned the hard way that you don’t use gasoline and a steel bristled broom to clean stubborn stains off of a concrete floor. The fire has flashed up and gotten away from him. They got it out but he had some first and second degree burns on his hands and arms. His adrenaline was still in high gear so they didn’t bother him very much yet. They all knew that situation would not last. The threat of infection was very real and Rampart wanted him brought in.

Tacy glared at Cassie till she got into the ambulance with the victim. They had him on medication. He was just laying happily on the gurney singing softly to himself. Cassie checked him over quickly. He was securely strapped in and his IVs were in place. She nodded at the cap who closed the doors and pounded on them twice to indicate to the driver that they were ready and he could take off to Rampart.

The sounds of the doors closing and the pounding sounded unusually loud to Cassie. There was a strange sound of finality to them. She sat down on the bench. She heard the driver say that their ETA was 15 minutes. ‘15 minutes, no time at all,’ Cassie told herself. She looked around. It suddenly seemed very close in there. Her hands were starting to sweat and she could hear the blood pounding in her ears. It crossed her mind to take her pulse but she refused. This was ridiculous. The cap was dead wrong. She wasn’t afraid of anything. Least of all this. She’d done it lots of times before. She wished there was a window she could glance out. That’s all she wanted was a glance. Just to know what was going on out there. What was heading for them. She grabbed the armrest. It was getting hard to breathe. She looked at the patient. He was too out of it to notice anything. God! when would they get there? Calm down, Cassie. You’re acting like a horse’s ass. Nothing is going to happen. Lightening does not strike twice. Man! It was close in there. There was a heaviness in her chest she could not explain. She mentally paced off the steps to the door. To freedom. 15 minutes? It seemed like an hour already. She told herself that the swaying and lurching that she felt were perfectly normal in a speeding vehicle that was as topheavy as this one was. Man! It was hot in there. She was sweating like mad. She looked around for something to fan herself with. Finally the ambulance came to a stop and then backed up a short distance. They were here. She blasted that door open with enough ferocity to have killed anyone that had been standing there. She had to get out. She stepped down out and sucked in a lungful of that beautiful, smog-filled LA air. She willed herself to calm down. They had made it without anyone broadsiding them. She wiped her sweaty hands off on her pants. The attendants joined her and they brought the patient inside. Once she was in familiar surrounding all signs of the panic attack disappeared. She forced herself to think it had never happened at all. It’s not like she lost it or anything. The cap was just plain nuts, that’s all.

* * * * *

When they got back to the station the cap asked her how it had gone and she had made light of the whole thing. Anything to get these people off of her back. Why did these people keep dwelling on the past?

Since they had missed lunch, they had an early dinner. They were still arguing about whose turn it was to do the dishes when they were toned out as a backup unit. They were quite often called upon as back up. It seemed to be the County’s way to expose them to a variety of runs since they were all still technically rookies.

“Holy shit,” Cassie gasped as she pulled the squad up to the incident. Traffic had been backed up for miles but the police had managed to get them through. They were at the scene of a drawbridge. It was only partially opened. The tail lights and back bumper of the car were about all that was visible of a car that had overshot the barrier and was hanging precariously off the bridge.

Station 51 was was the primary response unit. They had the car tied off. Captain Stanley approached Captain Tacy. The bridge was at a forty five degree angle. Everyone from 51 was tied off with safety belts.

“It’s a real mess, Maggie. Carload of old laides. They say they were on their way home from a bridge club meeting but according to DeSoto they should have been playing Gin Rummy, if you get my drift. They never even noticed the barrier was down and the bridge was going up. We’re getting the two out of the backseat now. The car is tied off but it’s none too secure. If you could set up a med area down here where it’s flat it would help out. We could probably use some more man power on those lines but I hate to put much more weight up there.”

Just then Roy and Mike Stoker came walking down the steep bridge. They each walked an elderly woman so they walked very slowly.

“Need some help?” Pidge asked Roy.

“Probably. Why don’t you releive Stoker. An old lady hitting on him has him a little rattled,” Roy laughed quietly. “I think Johnny could use some help. By some miricle, they don’t seem to be injured but they are all about three sheets to the wind so it’s a little hard to tell.”

“I’m lighter. I’ll go help Johnny,” Cassie volunteered.

“Safety belt and line, Kelly,” Captain Tacy said in a tone that brooked no argument. “Tink, you’re light, you take the HT up there and keep us informed. You get a line on too.”

“Right, Cap,” Tink said running back to the engine for her gear.

Neither Cassie nor Tink had any fear of heights so they made their way up to the accident much faster than Roy and Mike had been able to come down. Since Mike had not been sent back up and since he had had enough of old ladies for one day, he went over to where the engines were parked. There was enough police presence here that someone stealing something from one of the engines was probably not a concern but he just thought an engineer should be close to them anyway.

Cassie and Tink tied off their ropes. Johnny was at the passenger side door. He had it opened and was trying to get a safety belt around the passenger. Chet was working his line. Marco held onto the line that Johnny was trying to get the victim on. Marco was ready whenever they were.

“You okay there, Johnny?” Cassie called down.

“Yeah. I’m okay.”

“Just holler if you need help.”

“You can walk Sadie here down when we get her free. She does not appear to be injured ----”

Suddenly one of the chains that held the car snapped. A piece of chain hit Chet in the side of the head and he tumbled off the bridge into the abyss. Both Cassie and Tink dove for his line. He was tied off but now that he was no longer touching the bridge he needed a guide on it.

The car lurched when the chain snapped and Sadie jumped out into Johnny’s arms. He did not have the belt in place. She clung to him for dear life and he could not hold onto her. “Get us up! GET US UP!” he hollered desperately.

“We need help up here!” Tinker yelled into the HT. Then she shoved it into her pocket and grabbed onto the line to help Cassie steady Chet.

Captains Stanley and Tacy along with Barb Yates and Lila Crenshaw came tearing up the bridge. Crenshaw and Tacy set about re-securing the car. Barb and Stanley joined Marco, who had abandoned the line he had been holding to work Johnny’s. Together the three of them got Johnny and the old lady up onto the bridge.

Once the car was secured, attention turned to Chet who was dangling from his line. He had not moved. “I’m going after him,” Cassie said climbing over the railing. She ignored both captains. She didn’t even care if anyone worked her line. She just knew she had to get to her brother.

Chet’s safety belt had slid up to his armpits. He hung limp in the air. He wasn’t moving at all.

Cassie rappelled down to the bottom of the bridge. She then grabbed his rope and used it to lower herself to him. She kept listening for him to make some sort of nasty remark but he was deadly silent. She wanted to hurry but she forced herself to go slowly and carefully.

When she finally reached him, she could see that his helmet had been dented by the force of the blow. She eased it off of him. He had a pretty good scalp laceration in spite of the protection that the helmet had offered. He was unconscious but he was alive. He moaned quietly as she assessed him.

“Easy there, Big Brother, I’ll get you out of this mess,” she said softly, as much to allay her own nerves as anything.

“What do you need?” Pidge hollered down from the bridge.

For the first time Cassie looked around her. Johnny was once more at the car working to free the last victim. Victim, Cassie snorted to herself. Man, she hated drunks. Marco was helping him and it looked like they had things well in hand. She turned her attention back to Chet. The bleeding could probably wait till they were topside but he could have a neck or spine injury.

“C- collar and a small backboard,” she called back.

They lowered the c-collar first. It was easy to get in place even at this altitude. The backboard was a little harder, even though it was not a full body board. She worked her way behind him and placed the board against his back. She gently wrapped her legs around it and him while she strapped it onto him. She tried not to jostle him but as they were in thin air, that was impossible. He groaned.

“Easy, Chet,” she urged as she finished securing him to the board. She did another quick check on him and then signalled to be pulled up. He started to cough as they began to move. She suspected that the belt was bothering him now that it was across his chest. There was nothing she could do about it now. He needed that belt and there was no way for her to adjust it.

They had a stokes basket ready for him. After they had lowered him into it Cassie cut the safety belt off of him. He began to breathe easier. She ignored the glares of two captains as she commanded Stoker and Barb to get him down where she could treat him. Johnny and Marco were ready to bring the last old lady up so everyone turned their attention to them.

Roy was waiting below. He had a line open to Rampart. As soon as they put him down she began taking vitals and calling them to Roy so he could relay them.Chet was starting to come around. “Come on, Big Brother, wake up and talk to me,” Cassie urged.

“What’s this I hear about you and Gage making out at Rampart?” he groaned in a weak voice.

“What?!”

“Nurses have been....calling the station,” he panted.

“Looks like your plan backfired,” Roy laughed at Cassie then turned to Chet. “And it looks like you’re going to have to go into Rampart and have that gash in your head looked at,” he told him as he helped Cassie bandage it.

“Aw, Roy. This is nothing. You know us Kellys have hard heads,” Chet pleaded.

“That’s for sure,” Roy agreed enthusiastically.

“Well, they are going to have to sew this back up, Big Brother. The vacuum of your brain is causing a disturbance in the Earth’s atmosphere.”

“Hardy har har, Mr Spock.”

“That’s what you get for making me watch all those Star Trek episodes with you,” she teased as she began to cut off his shirt.

“What the hell are you cutting up my shirt for? Those cost money, you know.”

“I kind of like cutting off firemen’s clothes. That’s one of the perks of this job, you know,” she grinned.

“Pervert,” he complained. “Ow! Be careful, huh?”

“He’s got some contusions on his arm and shoulder here,” she reported to Roy.

“What’s that in layman’s terms?” Chet asked.

“Bruises,” Roy told him.

“Ah ow. Now, what are you doing, ya brat?” Chet suddenly had the feeling he was at her mercy. That was not a good feeling.

“And there is marked tenderness where the belt caught him here,” Cassie went on. “Which I guess beats a big splash in the river.”

“Aw come on, Cass. I really feel like galloping shit here,” Chet begged.

“You feeling nauseous?”

“A little,” he admitted. “Man, my head hurts. Like the granddaddy of all hangovers.”

She checked his eyes again and took another set of vitals.

Roy reported her findings. He looked up the bridge to see Captain Stanley walking the fourth old lady down. She was doing far more staggering then walking. The cap walked her right over to where the police were waiting to talk to her. Then he came over to the med area.

“How’s Chet?”

“They're torturing me, Cap,” Chet said piteously.

Stanley smiled with relief that he seemed to be all right. “He gonna need an ambulance?”

“Yes. I have one rolling,” Roy told him.

“Good. Looks like your partner will be hitching a ride too,” Stanley told Roy as Pidge walked Johnny into the med area. His nose was bleeding profusely.

“What happened?” Roy asked.

“She hid be wif her damn purse,” Johnny complained. “Shud ub, Ched.”

“Did you ask her for any Walnettos?” Chet asked.

“Whad da hell is he tawging aboud?” Johnny asked as Pidge worked on his nose.

“Don’t pay any attention to him. He probably has a concussion. But don’t worry about a thing, Big Brother. Johnny and I will be happy to stay with you and -----”

“NO WAY!! He’s not getting another crack at burning my house down. Besides I think I need to go to Rampart anyway and check up on all those rumors. Maybe start a few of my own. Wonder if those nurses know about this thing Johnny has suddenly developed for older women,” Chet grinned, pointing to the four ladies they had just rescued.

“Ha ha, Ched.”

“Johnny’s right, Chet,” Roy said. “At least one of them has her eye on Stoker.”

Stoker had come over to the med area to see about Johnny and Chet. He muttered something under his breath and walked back to his engine.

“Good one, Roy,” Chet said with true admiration.

By the time the ambulance arrived Johnny’s nosebleed was under control and Johnny, Roy and the two captains had had their heads together conspiratorially. It was decided that Roy and Pidge would answer questions the police had about the condition of the driver and her passengers and that Cassie would accompany both Chet and Johnny into Rampart. It was unclear in the field whether Johnny’s nose was broken or not. Johnny’s shirt was covered with blood and he held an ice-filled towel to his nose. He got into the ambulance first. He sat on the bench with a groan.

“You keep that ice on your nose,” Roy called from outside the ambulance and Chet was loaded in. Once the attendants were out of the way Cassie took a deep breath and got in. She suspected that Johnny was there to officially observe her behavior in the ambulance. It made her mad.

The motion had made Chet feel worse. He suddenly looked very pale. She leaned over him. “You okay?”

“I don’t know,” Chet said honestly.

“You feeling dizzy or anything?”

“A little.”

“You gonna hurl?”

“Nice talk,” he groaned.

“Are you?”

“Don’t think so.”

“Close your eyes.”

“Why?” he asked suspiciously.

“Just do it, Warthog.” He obeyed and she laid a wet towel over his eyes. “Better?”

“Yeah, but don’t think that just because I’m blindfolded that you and Gage can make out,” he tried to tease but his words did not carry their usual acid and his weakness was obvious.

“Don’t worry, Ched, by dose is too sore for anyding like dat,” Johnny assured him.

Cassie didn’t worry about getting in on the bantering. She just made sure that Chet was ready to roll then signaled to Roy. He closed the doors and banged on the back. Damn! She didn’t remember that sound being so loud before. She sat down next to Johnny and took a deep breath.

Johnny patted her arm in a reassuring manner. “It’ll be o-gay,” he said quietly.

“What will?” She was suspicious.

“Ched will.”

Is that what he thought? She was worried about Chet. Suddenly she realized that she actually had been. When he went over the railing her heart had literally stopped. The idea of losing the big lug was scary. Even scarier than riding in an ambulance, she admitted. She had always sworn she wasn’t afraid of anything. She put her head back against the side of the ambulance and took another deep breath. “Shit,” she muttered without thinking.

“You’re doin’ vine,” Johnny said. “Work through id.”

She looked at him even more suspiciously. She couldn’t let him know she was scared. She wasn’t scared, damn it. She wasn’t afraid of anything, she vowed. She squared her shoulders. It wasn’t going to defeat her. Okay, maybe she couldn’t deny it but she could sure as hell beat it. She would be riding in a lot of ambulances throughout her career. She’d just deal with it. Head on just like she dealt with everything else. She focused her energy. She took another deep breath. This time she didn’t feel so shaky. She was deep in thought when suddenly the ambulance lurched violently. There was the sound of screeching brakes. They were obviously sliding. She jumped to her feet. Her only thought was to protect Chet. He was helpless strapped to that gurney. She leaned over him as things began to fall from the shelves onto her back but she protected his head. Johnny was up beside her doing the same thing. He had grabbed onto the overhead compartment and to the gurney to try and keep it in place. Chet screamed. The spin seemed to last forever. They braced for a sudden impact but it never came. They stopped with a jolt but it was not hard enough to make them think they had hit anything.

They barely heard the attendant yell back to ask them if they were all right when the crashes started. There were three of them one right after the other. Then silence.

“Damn,” Johnny spat. He had dropped the towel and could speak much more clearly without anything against his sore nose.

“You okay?” she asked Chet as she quickly checked him over.

“I-I guess s-so.”

“We gotta get out there and see what happened,” Johnny said. They had all recognized the sickening sound of metal against metal that meant a car crash. Possibly more than one.

Cassie grabbed the first aide kit. “Let’s go. You stay here, Chet.”

“Where the hell am I gonna to go?” he demanded.

Johnny pushed the door opened. They were westbound in a north south lane just north of a major intersection. They had not been traveling with lights and sirens. It was not that someone had failed to yield to the emergency vehicle. Cassie looked at the intersection. That was the problem the lights were green in all directions. They were not the only ones who had spun out. There were several other cars stopped apparently helter skelter along the street on both sides of the intersection. They could see at least three separate collisions. The ambulance driver and attendant got out. They seemed a little shaken but unhurt.

“Call this in,” Johnny hollered to them. “Let’s start checking these cars out.” He headed for the worst looking of the pileups. It was between a small station wagon and a pick-up truck. The small car was wedged under the pick-up which was precariously on two wheels. The truck driver crawled out the passenger side of his truck. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Let's see what we can do for these people,” the rancher told him.

Johnny went around to the back of the small car. The back window had been open. He reached in and got the tail gate opened. “Everybody okay in here?”

“I - I think so,” The woman who had been driving stated in a shaky voice. “Are you kids okay?”

“Geez Mom! That was sooooo coool,” her ten year old son declared.

“Never mind that! Are you hurt?”

“We’re okay. Aren’t we, jerkface?”

“Shut up, creepoid,” his sister returned vehemently.

“Can you crawl out over the seats this way?” Johnny asked. He had learned from his experience with the Kellys to nip a brother/sister argument in the bud. He noticed with approval that everyone in the car had their seatbelts on. He got the two kids out first. The mother was also able to crawl out over both sets of seats and out the back. Johnny took them over and sat them on the curb. He couldn’t find a scratch on any of them.

“Never mind us,” the woman said with concern after seeing his shirt. “What about you? You look like you’re injured.”

“No, that was from a nose bleed earlier,” Johnny laughed. “It had nothing to do with this. If you people are okay, just sit here till the police come over and get your statements. I’m going to see if anyone else needs any help.”

“Thank you so much,” the grateful woman said. “Now that I look at it from this angle, it’s a miracle none of us is hurt.”

“Don’t thank me. Thank your seat belts,” Johnny told her.

“See kids. See why I always insist you wear them even though none of the other kids have to wear them.”

“Mom,” the boy rolled his eyes. He knew he’d never get out of wearing them ever now.

Johnny left the woman and the kids to see if he could help anyone else out. It looked like everyone had gotten themselves out of the third wreck so Johnny went to help Cassie with the second. This one involved three cars. One was sandwiched between the other two. Cassie was at the last car.

“Everyone okay?” Johnny asked.

“Looks that way but they don’t speak any English so I’ll talk them out. The people in the second car waved that they were okay but I haven’t gotten to the first one yet. Wanna check them out?”

“Will do.” Johnny trotted up to the first car. It was a late model luxury car. He knocked on the window. A middle age man rolled down the window. “Are you all right, sir?”

“I will be in a minute. As soon as this nitro pill kicks in.”

“You have a heart condition? Are you having chest pains?”

“I’ll be fine in a minute, young man.”

“I think we should have a doctor decide that, sir,” Johnny advised seriously.

“I am a doctor. Cardiac Specialist, as a matter of fact.”

* * * * *

Cassie had gotten the last of the people out of the last car. They were tourists from Central America. Rush hour LA traffic was a little more than they were ready for, they decided. They were confused and a bit frightened but unhurt.

Cassie went to the second car. It was a large Buick station wagon. Both the driver and the passenger side door had been damaged in the accident. The occupants were trapped. The car had spun completely around so it was heading in the opposite direction that it had been before the wreck. The passenger side door was facing Cassie so she approached it and looked inside.

“Hi ya Cassie!” greeted a familiar voice.

“Roland! How are you?” she was surprised to see the boy she had gotten out of the tuba earlier.

“I’m okay. We were on the way to the music store to get another tuba. Ya see, Mom, sometimes accidents just happen. Right, Cassie?”

“Right, Roland.”

“Cassie got me out of the tuba. She’ll get us out of here, no sweat.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Roland,” she grinned and realized that it actually did mean a lot to her. Of course she’d get them out. It was her job and she was good at it. All of it. Even the shitty parts like being stuck in the back of a speeding ambulance. Station 10 arrived and helped with the extrication. Soon everyone was out. No one was hurt. The ambulance drivers had given the police their statements and since they were only witnesses they were sent on their way with their original passengers.

By the time they got to Rampart, Dixie was anxiously awaiting their arrival. “I don’t believe this!” she stated.

“You don’t believe it,” Cassie said. “I’d always heard that lightening didn’t strike twice.”

“How you doing, Chet?” Dixie asked. “Dr Brackett will see you in three. You know you Kellys are starting to rival Johnny here for the title of most frequent visitor.”

“Hey we are not. That’s one title Johnny can keep. Besides, he’s here as a patient now too.”

“I know and Doctor Morton is waiting for him in two.”

“Doctor Morton,” Johnny whined.

“I’ll go with you,” Dixie promised. “Cassie can go with Chet.”

“Gee thanks,” both Chet and Cassie said in complete unison.

* * * * *

Unlike Cassie, Chet had had no objections when Brackett wanted to keep him overnight for observation, especially on a night he was on Fire Department time. They had told Cassie she could see him when he was squared away in a room. She waited in the doctors’ lounge.

She took a deep breath. What a day this had been.

Johnny walked in and hit the coffee machine right away. He was wearing a surgical scrub shirt.

“Doctor Gage, I presume,” she laughed.

“Well they didn’t like my bloody shirt. Guess they thought it was bad for business. This will have to do till I can get back to the station and change. How’s Chet?”

“I guess he’s okay. They are keeping him overnight so it looks like you guys 'll have to struggle through the rest of the shift without him.”

“We’ll try and manage. It all happened so fast I didn’t really see what happened to him on the bridge.”

“A chain busted loose and hit him. He went over the edge like a sack of potatoes. Must be that Irish blood, huh?”

“He’ll be okay,” Johnny assured her. He saw right through her bravado. “If there’s one thing we know about Kellys, it’s that they have hard heads, right?”

“Right,” she laughed.

“So how are you doing?”

“Guess that depends on what you tell Captain Tacy.”

“What?” He choked on his coffee.

“She has it in her head that I have some kind of phobia about ambulances now.”

“Well if you do, you come by it honestly. I gotta tell you what happened this afternoon scared me. What about you?”

“What do you think?”

“Well, I’d say, based on my observation, that you acted exactly the way you were supposed to in that situation. You did your job. You put it behind you and did what you could to help the victims. Nobody can expect more than that.”

She stared at him trying to decide whether or not he was patronizing her.

“Look, I’ll tell you a little secret. Whenever we are on a night run, every time I am on foot and see oncoming headlights, I panic for just a split second. I don’t think anyone notices but I do. See, I got rundown once in a situation like that.”

“I remember. Chet told me. He was bitching about Brice being assigned to 51's.”

“Well ever since that night. I’ve had that problem.”

“What do you do about it?”

“I just tell myself 'okay, it happened once, that doesn’t mean it will happen again'. And then I force myself to move, that kind of breaks the hold the fear has on me and I can function.”

“Sometimes lightening does strike twice.”

“Yeah but this time, you’re ready for it. You just move a little faster to get out of the way. There is nothing wrong with fear. A little fear can be a healthy thing. You just can’t let it cripple you, you know.”

“Yeah. I do. I guess in this line of work, shit happens sometimes. If you want to do the job you just have to deal with it.”

“That’s about the size of it.”

“Well, I worked too damn hard to get here to let some stupid phobia drive me out.”

“Atta girl. Besides now that I finally have an ally against Chet, I don’t ya driven out either.”

“You are getting to handle him pretty well. If you get much better we’ll have to make you an honorary Kelly.”

“Whoa, I don’t think I’m ready for that yet,” he laughed.

“Whoa,” she mused. “Captain Tacy said I had to get back on the horse that threw me.”

“Well, I’d certainly say you were back in the saddle again,” Johnny said finishing his coffee and getting up. “Well, I imagine our partners are finally here and looking for us by this time.”

They walked to the door together. Just as they were leaving Betty Gimbal was coming in. She stared at them, her eyes eager to see something else to add to the rumor she had going.

They dared not look at each other for fear that they would start laughing as they left the lounge and headed for the ER.

Cassie fought to keep a straight face. Let Betty spread all the rumors she wanted. Johnny was a good friend and nothing screwed up a good friendship like romance. It would get in the way of the job too. The job was too important to her to let anything get in the way of it. Not romance. Not the hole in her memory. Not the possibility of another ambulance crash. She liked what she was doing way too much. She wondered if there would be time to sneak up and bug Chet a little before they left. She resigned herself to the fact that he was going to continue to worry about her, no matter what she did. She even admitted that she had been worried about him.

Neither Roy nor Pidge were around but there was a note for her that Chet was in room 605. They both decided to go up. When they got to his room three giggling student nurses were just leaving.

"What's that all about?" Cassie asked.

"Oh nothing, I was just explaining to the girls that if they think paramedics are sexy, they should try fireman. You know what they say, "Hug a fireman in the morning and stay warm all day," Chet said with a satisfied smile, as he folded his hands behind his head.

"You really get off on all this, don't you, Big Brother?"

"What's not to like? It's just like being in a hotel. Twenty four hour room service, cable TV. I could really get used to this. All I have to do is press this button and a beautiful nurse comes running to see to my heart's desire."

Just then a nurse stuck her head in the door.

"Sometimes I don't even have to press the button," Chet grinned.

"Mr Kelly," she bubbled excitedly, "I have a wonderful surprise for you!"

"What is it, Julie?" Chet smiled. He'd already scoped out all the nurses on the floor.

"We didn't want you to be lonely in here all by yourself," she began.

Chet leered at Johnny ready to gloat over his good fortune. Beautiful nurses with nothing to do but think about his every whim.

"So since we have another fireman on the floor who is here for some routine dental surgery, we decided to move him in here with you so you'd have someone to talk to. Like you say, firemen are special, so we figured it would take another fireman to really make you feel at home."

Chet tried to hide his disappointment. "Oh, ah, gee, thanks for thinking about me but it really isn't  necessary to go to any trouble."

"No trouble. Girls, wheel Mr Brice on in here...."

"Brice?!!"

"That's right, Brice is on sick call, isn't he, Cassie. That's why the paramedic meeting was cancelled for today," Johnny remembered gleefully.

"I forgot about that. Well, with Brice to keep Chet company, I guess we don't have to wait around, Johnny," Cassie pointed out. Cassie had to hand it to the nurses. They saw right through Chet's bull and hit him where it hurts the most. Brice for a roommate. She wished she had thought of that herself.

"No, wait!! You guys can't just leave me here with Brice!" Chet was starting to panic.

"They certainly can. They are supposed to be on duty," Brice's all too familiar voice snapped as he was wheeled into the room.

"Johnny! Cassie!" Chet was calling desperately as they left.

"Don't worry, Chet. You're in good hands," Johnny called over his shoulder.

"I'll get you guys for this," Chet promised.

"You just behave yourself and if you're good they will release you in the morning. I'll come pick you up."

"Maybe we both will, after a nice breakfast out," Johnny teased.

"Gage! You stay away from my sister. Gage!!!"

They could hear him hollering as they waited for the elevator. The doors finally opened. The first person to step off was Betty Gimbal. She eyed them suspiciously as they got on. When the doors closed they both gave in to the giggles. The orderly that shared the car with them probably thought they were nuts. 'You had to laugh whenever you could in this job,' Cassie decided. It was what kept you sane. The job had its rough moments but it was still the only thing in the world she wanted to do.