I’d like to see pregnant Penny.

(here is prelude again, and I’m gonna go ahead and slap a big ol trigger warning on this one: tw: miscarriage. sorry folks, this is the soap opera AU.)

It’s generally considered that the nightmare scenario for a dispatcher is to take a call in which a friend or family member is involved, but John’s got three brothers in three separate lines of emergency service, and it’s not that big a city. He’s pretty sure if he worked it out, he’d find he routes a call to one or the other of them at least once a week, and this is compounded by the fact that he hears about it, any time one of his colleagues dispatches one of the Tracy brood for whatever reason. John and his brothers are halfway to being city mascots, by this point.

Deep down he’s still afraid of the day he hears Grandma’s voice, or Alan’s. But he’s used to hearing his brothers. It took him a while to get used to it, but John’s mostly managed to inure himself to the shock of hearing a familiar voice on the line. In a weird way he almost looks forward to it. Makes it seem almost like their family is together enough to have something as normal and stable as a family business.

So John’s used to hearing from family. And he doesn’t have enough friends outside of work to have properly considered it a risk he’d ever have to worry about.

When the call comes in, the fact that he knows the address offhand doesn’t quite ring the right bell. He’s already slipped into dispatch mode, and the only reason the address matters is with respect to nearby ambulances. He’s on the line with an older sounding woman, calling about one of her staff members, a twenty-six year old female who’d been found collapsed on the bathroom floor by one of the patrons. She’s bleeding, has bled through her skirt, enough that she’s left blood on the floor where she’d fallen.

John’s already got an ambulance on route, and he’s talking the woman through instructions to treat the onset of shock, when she breaks off in the middle of a question to exclaim, “Oh, no no no, Penny, darlin’, don’t. Shh, shh shh. Sweetness, you just lie back now, don’t try to—”

And for the first time since he was a rookie, John freezes up in the middle of a call.

Can I offer a prompt please – handmade gifts

rent-day-blues:

rent-day-blues:

rent-day-blues:

(prelude here, I’ma start this one off with…)

Gordon’s last gift to his older brother was a pamphlet listing a variety of hand and wrist exercises, in an effort to help stave off the carpal tunnel syndrome that’s probably just about inevitable, considering all the typing his brother does. Of the five of them, John and Alan are the only ones who spend any time at desks any longer, and though it doesn’t happen often, occasionally John ends up with idle time on his hands, nothing to do while he sits at his desk. Come Christmastime, it becomes apparent that he’s been putting this time to productive use. It’s not clear if he’s used any of this idle time for the provided wrist exercises.

Apparently one of the other dispatchers had taught him the basics over the course of a couple lunch breaks. Apparently she’d gotten him started with a spare pair of needles, and an old skein of yarn that she’d meant for him just to practice with—by her standards, the colour of it was too bright and gaudy for anyone to reasonably want to wear, bright, chunky, golden rod yellow—but John’s a fast learner and a perfectionist, and by the end of a few particularly slow weeks, he’d had a respectable four feet worth of scarf, garter stitched the whole way through. 

John says it’s nothing much, and that he won’t mind in the least if Gordon doesn’t wear it. He doesn’t even know if it’ll be particularly warm, being made of cheap acrylic yarn, nothing like high quality wool. He’d made it just to make it, after all, it was only supposed to be for practice. And anyway it’s out of regs, as far as the uniform goes.

Gordon doesn’t care. Gordon loves it. And he wears it from the depths of December, right up until the city starts to thaw out again.

Grandma used to do this when she was a girl, and the Depression made everything scare and then scarcer still.

Keep reading

Alan’s not sure what Scott was trying to prove, giving him something of Mom’s. Especially her wedding ring. 

Keep reading

Penny wasn’t brought up to be the kind of girl to do her own baking.

She was brought up to be genteel and ornamental and functionally useless. She was brought up to be pretty and charming and obedient, to go where she was told and to do as she was bid.

The diner doesn’t care about pretty, or charming, or even obedient as long as the eggs made it to the table still hot from the kitchen.  The diner cares about girls that can carry eight plates at once and keep the coffee topped up.

It’s exhausting and leaves her coated in grease, and it doesn’t pay enough, even with tips that are delivered as often as not with a slap on her ass, but a part of her is so, so proud of herself for making it this far.

The library cookbook has a thumbprint marked in grease on the corner of the page.  Penny’s got her tongue permanently parked in the corner of her mouth as she studies the instructions and guesses weights and measures with a chipped coffee mug and a bowl that she’d been using to hold her fruit.

The result is lopsided, the icing slowly oozing downhill to spill over one side.  But the candles encountered nothing but fluffy sweetness as she jammed them in, setting them aflame with Virgil’s borrowed lighter.

Gordon’s eyes are golden in the firelight as he leans in to blow out the candles. “Happy birthday, darling,” Penny said as she kissed his cheek, mindful of his brothers and Grandmother ringed around the table.  “What did you wish for?”

Gordon wasn’t brought up to be genteel or charming.  He catches her jaw in a gentle hand, pulls her in for a kiss that still makes her toes curl.  “Nothing.  I’ve already got everything I could want.”

Can I offer a prompt please – handmade gifts

rent-day-blues:

rent-day-blues:

(prelude here, I’ma start this one off with…)

Gordon’s last gift to his older brother was a pamphlet listing a variety of hand and wrist exercises, in an effort to help stave off the carpal tunnel syndrome that’s probably just about inevitable, considering all the typing his brother does. Of the five of them, John and Alan are the only ones who spend any time at desks any longer, and though it doesn’t happen often, occasionally John ends up with idle time on his hands, nothing to do while he sits at his desk. Come Christmastime, it becomes apparent that he’s been putting this time to productive use. It’s not clear if he’s used any of this idle time for the provided wrist exercises.

Apparently one of the other dispatchers had taught him the basics over the course of a couple lunch breaks. Apparently she’d gotten him started with a spare pair of needles, and an old skein of yarn that she’d meant for him just to practice with—by her standards, the colour of it was too bright and gaudy for anyone to reasonably want to wear, bright, chunky, golden rod yellow—but John’s a fast learner and a perfectionist, and by the end of a few particularly slow weeks, he’d had a respectable four feet worth of scarf, garter stitched the whole way through. 

John says it’s nothing much, and that he won’t mind in the least if Gordon doesn’t wear it. He doesn’t even know if it’ll be particularly warm, being made of cheap acrylic yarn, nothing like high quality wool. He’d made it just to make it, after all, it was only supposed to be for practice. And anyway it’s out of regs, as far as the uniform goes.

Gordon doesn’t care. Gordon loves it. And he wears it from the depths of December, right up until the city starts to thaw out again.

Grandma used to do this when she was a girl, and the Depression made everything scare and then scarcer still.

Keep reading

Alan’s not sure what Scott was trying to prove, giving him something of Mom’s. Especially her wedding ring. 

He shouldn’t have it. Of anyone in the family, he definitely shouldn’t have it. Alan doesn’t even remember Mom, he’d only been six when she died. Six years isn’t any kind of time to know a person, Alan doesn’t remember anything about her that means anything. His memories of Mom begin with her getting sick, and end with her coffin descending into a hole in the deep dark ground, while he’d clung weepily to one of his brothers at her graveside. He doesn’t even remember which of them it had been, he just knows for sure it wasn’t his father.

He doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do with his mother’s wedding ring.

Scott had given it to him for his sixteenth birthday, threaded onto a sterling silver chain that certainly wasn’t new, and might possibly have been removed from the neck of a drug dealer or similar, on their way into lock up. Alan had put it on, and now he wears it out of habit, and because he’d feel weird and ungrateful if he wanted to take it off. Which he doesn’t. Even in spite of the weirdness of the gift, and the fact that he feels guilty for having it, for some reason he also doesn’t quite want to take it off.

His mother had small hands. Alan doesn’t remember that about her, but he can determine that it’s true, from the way only his pinkie finger actually fits through the ring. Sometimes, in idle moments, he’ll lift his hand to the necklace and slip the ring over his smallest finger. He’ll think about the woman who wore the ring, and the man who would’ve put it on her finger, so many years ago. He’ll feel strange to think that hers was the last skin to have touched the inside of the ring, with its faint, faded, secondhand inscription: “Always”

Maybe Scott knew what he was doing, after all.

Can I offer a prompt please – handmade gifts

rent-day-blues:

(prelude here, I’ma start this one off with…)

Gordon’s last gift to his older brother was a pamphlet listing a variety of hand and wrist exercises, in an effort to help stave off the carpal tunnel syndrome that’s probably just about inevitable, considering all the typing his brother does. Of the five of them, John and Alan are the only ones who spend any time at desks any longer, and though it doesn’t happen often, occasionally John ends up with idle time on his hands, nothing to do while he sits at his desk. Come Christmastime, it becomes apparent that he’s been putting this time to productive use. It’s not clear if he’s used any of this idle time for the provided wrist exercises.

Apparently one of the other dispatchers had taught him the basics over the course of a couple lunch breaks. Apparently she’d gotten him started with a spare pair of needles, and an old skein of yarn that she’d meant for him just to practice with—by her standards, the colour of it was too bright and gaudy for anyone to reasonably want to wear, bright, chunky, golden rod yellow—but John’s a fast learner and a perfectionist, and by the end of a few particularly slow weeks, he’d had a respectable four feet worth of scarf, garter stitched the whole way through. 

John says it’s nothing much, and that he won’t mind in the least if Gordon doesn’t wear it. He doesn’t even know if it’ll be particularly warm, being made of cheap acrylic yarn, nothing like high quality wool. He’d made it just to make it, after all, it was only supposed to be for practice. And anyway it’s out of regs, as far as the uniform goes.

Gordon doesn’t care. Gordon loves it. And he wears it from the depths of December, right up until the city starts to thaw out again.

Grandma used to do this when she was a girl, and the Depression made everything scare and then scarcer still.

Her hands are gnarled now, and ache regardless of the weather, but even if her joints fight her the movements come back quick enough.  It’s not exactly dexterous work, but moving the bundles in and out of steaming pans even coaxes some warmth into always-frozen fingertips, fills the kitchen with clean, bright scents.

Virgil’s always been a kind boy, and even though he frowns when she presents him with the box full of waxy balls, each a cacophony of original colours, he still says ‘thank you’ and means it.  “But, uh, what are they?  Do you eat them?”

Grandma had to laugh at that.  “Only if  you’ve been swearing again,” she teases, plucking one out slowly and carefully.  “I used to make these for your great-grandpa.  Soap balls, full of oils and glycerin and all sorts of good stuff.  If it got the grease off his skin, it can get the smoke outta yours.”

Virgil flushes; Grandma knew he hadn’t told a soul how much the lingering scent of fire was bugging him, even months after he’d become a full-timer.  But she had nothing much left to do now but watch her boys, had seen him sniff and frown too many times.  He leans forward and she holds out the ball in her hand for him to sniff.  It’s only because she’s watching now does she see his nose wrinkle.  “Uh, thanks Grandma.”

She gave the ball another sniff herself.  “Hmm, maybe I did put too much patchouli oil in there?”  She shrugged and dropped it back in the box.  “Well, they’re made from ends I found in the sink, so throw them out if you don’t like them.”

Virgil’s gentle, almost reverent, as he takes the box from her and presses a dry kiss to her temples.

Can I offer a prompt please – handmade gifts

(prelude here, I’ma start this one off with…)

Gordon’s last gift to his older brother was a pamphlet listing a variety of hand and wrist exercises, in an effort to help stave off the carpal tunnel syndrome that’s probably just about inevitable, considering all the typing his brother does. Of the five of them, John and Alan are the only ones who spend any time at desks any longer, and though it doesn’t happen often, occasionally John ends up with idle time on his hands, nothing to do while he sits at his desk. Come Christmastime, it becomes apparent that he’s been putting this time to productive use. It’s not clear if he’s used any of this idle time for the provided wrist exercises.

Apparently one of the other dispatchers had taught him the basics over the course of a couple lunch breaks. Apparently she’d gotten him started with a spare pair of needles, and an old skein of yarn that she’d meant for him just to practice with—by her standards, the colour of it was too bright and gaudy for anyone to reasonably want to wear, bright, chunky, golden rod yellow—but John’s a fast learner and a perfectionist, and by the end of a few particularly slow weeks, he’d had a respectable four feet worth of scarf, garter stitched the whole way through. 

John says it’s nothing much, and that he won’t mind in the least if Gordon doesn’t wear it. He doesn’t even know if it’ll be particularly warm, being made of cheap acrylic yarn, nothing like high quality wool. He’d made it just to make it, after all, it was only supposed to be for practice. And anyway it’s out of regs, as far as the uniform goes.

Gordon doesn’t care. Gordon loves it. And he wears it from the depths of December, right up until the city starts to thaw out again.

picking up from @preludeinz through me to @drdone

Brain’s is glad that Kayo’s the one spinning lies.  Somehow, the mirrored lenses always seemed to reflect back a truer version of yourself than you wanted the Mechanic to see.

It’s how Brains had found himself in this mess in the first place.

He’s still not sure that the Mechanic is buying Kayo’s story, but at least he’s not outright angry.  Brains is so nervous waiting for the explosion he almost misses his cue to nod furiously when the Mechanic glances over to check Kayo’s point about taking Brains on a joyride.

Kayo looks relaxed in his presence, the slight arrogance Brains had come to identify with the real street rats, the ones who’d pick his pockets if it wasn’t for his ties to the big boss.  Brains himself can barely breathe as the Mechanic stares at her, impassive and unmoving.

“Bring me a car,” he growls finally, dismissing them with a flick of his hand. “Then we’ll talk.”

Brains almost yanks Kayo away, desperate to get deeper into the maze of makeshift workshops that had already sprung up in the new shop. He needed to talk to her without eavesdroppers.  “We’ve got a problem,” he manages to hiss with only one false start; Brains could see at a glance these weren’t racing pits.

“Chopshops,” Kayo murmurs, running a knowing look over the VIN cloning setup, the industrial grinders, all the accoutrements of slicing cars up in all the ways that couldn’t be traced.

Brains nods tightly.  He’d seen this twice before.  “He’s cleaning house.”

Kayo’s slight inhale told him she knew exactly what that meant.

* * *

“I’m giving her another ten minutes and then I’m calling it.”

Next to him, John sniggers softly, little more than an exhalation in the dim quiet.  “You said that ten minutes ago.  You’re not calling this in.”

Scott drags his gaze away from the door he’s been staring at for a good twenty minutes now to stare at his brother instead.  “You sound pretty sure of yourself there.”

John’s messing with his phone, texting or Tindr or Candy Crush, Scott can’t tell. He’s set the screen down as dark as it will go, but it’s still bright in the darkness, casting his brother’s cheekbone’s into even starker relief.  “You won’t call it in because right now you trust her a lot more than you trust the rest of your entire department not to screw this up.”  John looks up at that, a humourless smile pulling at the corner of his mouth.  “And you really don’t want to screw this up.”

The words it’s what dad would have done are like acid on his tongue, and even a year ago Scott would have spat them at John.  But he’s gotten good at keeping that anger deep down where it won’t show.  “What are you doing, anyway?” he asks instead, jerking his chin at John’s phone.

John’s thumbs are already flying again.  “Something this big, moving late model cars?  I’ve heard enough dispatch calls to know they use hackers to clear the plates.  And hackers,” he adds, pausing long enough to point at a discreet black box sitting on top of a fuse box near the door Kayo had vanished through twenty-two minutes ago now.  “Need wifi.  I’m just trying a few passwords….”

Scott scoffs despite himself.  “Somehow I don’t think anything the Hood’s involved in will use ‘password’ as a password.”  In cup holder by the handbrake, Scott’s own phone rattles, the screen flashing too bright.  Kayo’s message was terse, more code than words.  “Round back.”

John’s craning his neck to read upside down.  “Can’t get any plainer than that.”

Scott’s scowling as he turns the motor and eases them around the lot.

WHEW sorry for the delay. looping back around to the a-plot.

@preludeinz​ picking up from here courtesy of @drdone​ and passing off to @akireyta​

Her service weapon and her badge have both been entrusted to her partner, who isn’t happy about the plan, but admits that it’s a good one. It had been his brother who’d been her unexpected ally, who’d taken her side in the argument, and made the salient point that Kayo’s involvement on the inside track of the street racing circuit might just prevent any other kids like Alan from getting hurt, or worse. This is going to happen again anyway, and this might be the only chance they get to make sure they can stop it.

More surprising even than John’s support had been Scott’s eventual, grudging agreement.

So now she walks through the front door of her uncle’s warehouse with her head high and her shoulders back. Brains walks in front of her and she has to slow her pace in order to stay behind him, because her impulse is to stride out in front. It was her idea, after all.

At the far end of the warehouse, the Mechanic waits. She can feel him staring at her. Her teeth clench slightly, but she keeps her head high. She doesn’t flinch as she approaches, doesn’t shrink beneath his gaze, though he hides his eyes behind mirrored orange sunglasses. He’s dressed all in black, leather jacket, jeans, gloves on his hands and heavy soled boots. His hair is dark, shaved close to his scalp, patterns cut into it, razor sharp lines. He’s built beneath the jacket, Kayo can tell just from the way he holds himself, but shorter than Brains. If he’s not carrying a gun, she’ll eat her badge, or would if she hadn’t left it in the car, entrusted to her partner.

And she does trust her partner. Likewise, she can tell that he trusts her, and more than anything she wants to live up to that trust. Scott’s the reason she’s doing this, anyway.

She’s just not sure why Scott is the reason. A little voice at the back of her brain keeps saying it’s because he’s her partner, but it’s more than that. Loyalty was something her family always preached, but her loyalty to her family has been stripped and scoured away, abraded by all the wrong they’d done—not just to her personally, but to the world at large. Apparently the void left by cutting all ties to her background has been yearning for something to fill it. Kayo’s never had a partner before, never had this particular relationship with someone. She considers Scott a friend, but it’s more than just friendship. She feels a bone-deep devotion to him that she hadn’t expected. She hadn’t known what sort of a police officer she’d make—half the reason she’d gone into law enforcement was just in deliberate defiance of her own legacy—but she’d hoped to find herself drawn to something like a cause. Hoped to find something to fill the void where her loyalties had used to lie.

It’s a big, complicated feeling and it fills her up, fuels her, and fires her purpose like clay in a kiln, hardens it and makes it whole. It’s the reason she’s taken a few of her own days off work, in the name of bringing an end to the man who’s brought harm to her partner’s family. It’s the reason she can be here, and be unafraid, as she finally approaches the Mechanic, who stares at her for a few impassive seconds, before he looks to Brains, impatient and expectant. His voice is deep, oddly muffled when he growls, “Who the hell is this?”

Kayo’s got an answer of her own before Brains can so much as squeak out an apology for his tardiness.

“I’m just someone,” she starts, and squares her shoulders, hopes that her brashness and her confidence don’t tip her hand, give her away before the game’s even begun, “who heard that you’re looking for drivers.”

Submit a Prompt for this Universe!

tb5-heavenward:

Hey! Wanted to open up for prompts over on @rent-day-blues, which is the blog that me and @akireyta and @drdone are using to round-robin the Poor!AU, which you may remember from about a year back or so. It’s basically an AU about the family in relative poverty, and the boys all doing the jobs of assorted first responders (Scott the Cop, Gordon the EMT, Virgil the Paramedic, John as 911 dispatch and Alan the Screw Up Kid).

It’s got an overarching plot centralized around a big event, but we also wanted to expand out into little stories about the boys’ lives, etc, just to sort of flesh out the story in other dimensions.

If you’re interested, swing by and drop us a prompt maybe! Or read the thing, it’s Pretty Good so far.

Submit a Prompt for this Universe!

worst phone call john ever got vs. the best one (I imagine 911 call since he’s dispatch but take it how you like)

rent-day-blues:

The new kid’s been in the break room for an hour now, but after a call like that, it’s not like anyone can blame him. Fires are always bad, but this fire had trapped and killed two children, and the new kid had been on the line with their mother the whole time. It’s an hour since the end of the call, and he hasn’t said a word since.

The captain’s pulled him off his console, stuck him somewhere quiet to calm down. But it’s been an hour, and it’s time to send in the cavalry. The cavalry, in this case, has just clocked on for his first shift of the evening.

There’s a coffee machine and a beat up old kettle in the break room, but Ned doesn’t trust either of those things. He makes his tea at home and brings it to work in a two litre thermos, hot and strong and sweet, and sacrosanct. The new kid is still too new to recognize the magnitude of the gesture being made, when Ned ambles into the break room, pulls up a chair beside him, and pours out a generous cup of tea from his very own thermos. He pushes the mug over, clears his throat, and says, magnanimous, “There now, lad, a cup of tea will help.”

Even this doesn’t get an answer, and now that he’s sitting down, Ned can see that there’s a procedural manual open in the young man’s lap. There are a couple spots of damp on the open page, and Ned pretends not to notice these as he reaches over to close the book. He picks it up and sets it aside. “Now, don’t you go beating yourself ‘bout the head with the manual,” he chides gently. “Procedure sounds grand on paper, but it’s the only place this job is actually that black and white.”

“But I did everything right.” The protest is hollow, and the first thing Ned’s heard the boy say, since the call that’s left him in this state, shaken and numb. With the crisp professionalism—the rigour of training—stripped out of his voice, he sounds alarmingly young. Ned can’t help but wonder at his age, even as he shakes his head, confused as much as he’s hurt. “I—I know I did. If they’d gotten there just a minute sooner…”

“No doubt you did everything right, but sometimes it all goes awry even so. Can’t recall if it says so in the book, but it ought to. Sometimes even everything isn’t enough.” Ned heaves a sigh. “It’s a funny old world.”

“This isn’t funny.”

“I didn’t mean the sort of funny what gets a laugh. Meant the sort of funny that makes you feel sick inside.”

“Yeah, it’s definitely that.” There’s a shuddering sigh and the shake of a bowed ginger head. “I don’t think I can do this. I thought—I thought it wouldn’t get to me. But it’s so much worse than I imagined.”

Ned nudges the cup of tea closer again. “How old are you?” he asks, tries to make it sound like idle curiosity, rather than a question he means to use to make a point.

“Twenty-two,” is the answer, and Ned manages not to wince, though it’s about what he’d expected. Barely old enough to drink, or at least to drink in this country. Hopefully too young to be inclined to really start, because Ned’s seen far too many people in this line of work turn to stiffer drinks than tea.

But as sad as the fact is, it still helps him make his point. “I’ve been doing this job longer than you’ve been alive, lad. And I won’t lie to you—there’ll be worse days than this. But you’ll help so many people, and I hope you can believe me when I tell you, that’ll help get you through.”

“Really?”

“Really. You’ll be the best part of the worst day of people’s lives, and there’s worth in that. I know it won’t seem like it, but it’s true. Now, drink your tea, and let’s get you back out on the floor. Back in the saddle, son.”

Eventually, finally, the young man reaches out and wraps his hands around the warmth of the ceramic. “Okay,” he says. “I’ll try.”

(am i gonna pick this up? I’m gonna pick this up)

John’s trying not to lurk, but Gordon’s been at his first day of work for a whole three hours now, and John’s dying to know how it’s going.

Gordon’s still a probie, riding along with a senior team, and John knows he has nothing to worry about.  This isn’t like Virgil’s first day, where John had sat listening for fire dispatches until his head was ringing like a bell.  Gordon’s job only starts once the danger has passed, strictly enforced by regulations and rules they all know off by heart. Gordon’s safe.

Even so, John’s worrying for Gordon. He knows, they all know, how the first day in job knocks all the shine off, the carefully imagined perfect ideal of thrilling heroics and dramatic rescues. Gordon should know better, with three older brothers in the trade, but John recognized the shine in Gordon’s eyes as he’d tugged on his pristine and crisp uniform this morning.

John reached for the battered thermos tucked safely away under his station.  The steam helps clear his head, soothe his sore throat, in the little lull that John knows better than to expect would last.

He’s three sips in when boards across the room light up like it’s disaster Christmas.  The little cap-shaped mug by his side grows cold as John catches and throws messages, his eyes constantly glancing up at the situation monitor along the wall of the room.

Take old gas mains in the part of the city no-one’s patched up in decades.  Add sparks. Mix with over-crowded tenements and watch every service flirt with descending into chaos.

John’s supervisor is liaising with the fire chief, throws John the paramedic dispatch with gestures more than words.

Words are reserved for saving people.

There’s burns and broken bones, more glass than most people realize.  A gas main in a residential building was like a shrapnel bomb going off under the kitchen table.  John’s got half a dozen wagons in motion, a ballet of bodies and bandages negotiating their way around tankers and fire trucks and more squad cars than are useful at this point in the process.

“Hey,” Liesel got his attention over the low partition with a click of her fingers.  “Got someone here asking for you direct.”

“Throw it over,” John said, glancing up at the status of the fire units.  Virgil really needed to be broken of his annoying habit of calling to John directly. “Virg, I….”

“John?”  Gordon sounds tiny and young, and John immediately tracks to unit 24, Gordon’s ride-along for tonight, safely tucked away on the southern perimeter ready to roll into the building’s lot as soon as fire and rescue gave the all clear.  Gordon should be idling, gloves on and ready to follow his elders around like an obedient and safe little puppy.

“Gordon? What the….” in the background of the call came a scream of pain.  John’s identities stuttered, brother and dispatch crashing into each other.  “Report.”

“So Jack and Noorah went to go a sitrep and then this kid came and banged on my door and his mother, I think the blast set her off, and John, I think this baby isn’t going to wait for me to go fetch the wagon.”

John breathed out.  “You’ve been trained on maternal first aid, right?”

Gordon’s voice was thin, just this side of a reedy wail.  “Only in my textbook.  There weren’t even any pictures.”

John flicked three incoming calls to junior operators and settled back in his chair.  “Okay, Gordon, first thing you need to do…”

In his earpiece, Gordon’s breathing steadied as he obeyed John’s instructions, his training slowly locking into place with the messy, screaming, panicking human being in front of him.

“John, I think this kid is coming right now.” 

John bit his lip to stifle his laugh.  “Then catch it,” he said as patiently as he could.

One of the best tricks John ever learned as a trainee was to listen to the background, not just the voice on the line.  There was something unmistakable about the scream of a woman giving birth.  “Holy shit,” Gordon panted.

“Language,” John scolded mildly as he caught Liesel’s eye and gestured for her to put another tick on the new baby tally.  “Give it to her, keep them warm.”  His fingers were already tapping, rerouting one of the smaller units away from the disaster towards where Gordon’s GPS was throbbing like a heartbeat on his map.  “I’m sending two-two to collect them, they’re only a block away.”

“Got it,” Gordon managed to be professional for five seconds.  “Hey,” he cooed a second later, and John knew it wasn’t him Gordon was talking to.  “Welcome to the world, little lady.”

John knew he should end the call, log the incident, get back to helping his team coordinate paramedics around the crater.  But something made him linger.  “Gordon?”

“Two-two have got them.  Mission accomplished,” Gordon quipped weakly.

“You okay?”

There was a long pause. “Wow, that was…Johnny, that was really something else.”

John could see the service messages on his screen start to back up.  He took a deep breath.  “It really is.  But now other people need you.”

“Yeah. Blast. Shit, sorry…but wow is it weird I completely forgot about that?”

John leaned in, his hand hovering over his keys once more.  “Hey, think of it this way.  Your first baby.” He waited for Gordon’s happy little noise.  “I think there’s gonna be a lot more firsts for you today, probie, so time to gear up and get back in the saddle. Can you do that for me?”

A weak chuckle echoed in his ear.  “I’ll try.”

John ended the call and gave himself a moment to exhale, to feel the warm soft glow of pride.  Then he tapped a key and picked up the next call.

worst phone call john ever got vs. the best one (I imagine 911 call since he’s dispatch but take it how you like)

The new kid’s been in the break room for an hour now, but after a call like that, it’s not like anyone can blame him. Fires are always bad, but this fire had trapped and killed two children, and the new kid had been on the line with their mother the whole time. It’s an hour since the end of the call, and he hasn’t said a word since.

The captain’s pulled him off his console, stuck him somewhere quiet to calm down. But it’s been an hour, and it’s time to send in the cavalry. The cavalry, in this case, has just clocked on for his first shift of the evening.

There’s a coffee machine and a beat up old kettle in the break room, but Ned doesn’t trust either of those things. He makes his tea at home and brings it to work in a two litre thermos, hot and strong and sweet, and sacrosanct. The new kid is still too new to recognize the magnitude of the gesture being made, when Ned ambles into the break room, pulls up a chair beside him, and pours out a generous cup of tea from his very own thermos. He pushes the mug over, clears his throat, and says, magnanimous, “There now, lad, a cup of tea will help.”

Even this doesn’t get an answer, and now that he’s sitting down, Ned can see that there’s a procedural manual open in the young man’s lap. There are a couple spots of damp on the open page, and Ned pretends not to notice these as he reaches over to close the book. He picks it up and sets it aside. “Now, don’t you go beating yourself ‘bout the head with the manual,” he chides gently. “Procedure sounds grand on paper, but it’s the only place this job is actually that black and white.”

“But I did everything right.” The protest is hollow, and the first thing Ned’s heard the boy say, since the call that’s left him in this state, shaken and numb. With the crisp professionalism—the rigour of training—stripped out of his voice, he sounds alarmingly young. Ned can’t help but wonder at his age, even as he shakes his head, confused as much as he’s hurt. “I—I know I did. If they’d gotten there just a minute sooner…”

“No doubt you did everything right, but sometimes it all goes awry even so. Can’t recall if it says so in the book, but it ought to. Sometimes even everything isn’t enough.” Ned heaves a sigh. “It’s a funny old world.”

“This isn’t funny.”

“I didn’t mean the sort of funny what gets a laugh. Meant the sort of funny that makes you feel sick inside.”

“Yeah, it’s definitely that.” There’s a shuddering sigh and the shake of a bowed ginger head. “I don’t think I can do this. I thought—I thought it wouldn’t get to me. But it’s so much worse than I imagined.”

Ned nudges the cup of tea closer again. “How old are you?” he asks, tries to make it sound like idle curiosity, rather than a question he means to use to make a point.

“Twenty-two,” is the answer, and Ned manages not to wince, though it’s about what he’d expected. Barely old enough to drink, or at least to drink in this country. Hopefully too young to be inclined to really start, because Ned’s seen far too many people in this line of work turn to stiffer drinks than tea.

But as sad as the fact is, it still helps him make his point. “I’ve been doing this job longer than you’ve been alive, lad. And I won’t lie to you—there’ll be worse days than this. But you’ll help so many people, and I hope you can believe me when I tell you, that’ll help get you through.”

“Really?”

“Really. You’ll be the best part of the worst day of people’s lives, and there’s worth in that. I know it won’t seem like it, but it’s true. Now, drink your tea, and let’s get you back out on the floor. Back in the saddle, son.”

Eventually, finally, the young man reaches out and wraps his hands around the warmth of the ceramic. “Okay,” he says. “I’ll try.”