Monday, April 8, 2024
0618 Hours
The streets of Mariner Bay were just beginning to stir.
Streetlights still glowed amber against the predawn sky as the Gulf breeze carried the smell of saltwater inland. Commercial fishermen prepared their boats in the harbor while newspaper delivery trucks rumbled through downtown.
Lieutenant Raylan Lucas guided his red Ram 2500 through the quiet streets.
For the first time in over a week...
He wasn't headed to headquarters.
He wasn't headed to MBESTI.
Mariner Bay Emergency Services Training Institute.
He wasn't sitting through orientation, paperwork, policy briefings, or department history.
Today was different.
Today he was finally reporting to his firehouse.
Station 3.
The Pirate House.
The past week had been a blur.
The City of Mariner Bay had processed him into the department.
Uniforms.
Gear issue.
Department policies.
Radio procedures.
A week spent learning the history of a department that stretched back to 1884.
He had walked through MBESTI, listening to instructors proudly explain why agencies from across the country came there to train.
He had spent hours studying maps of Battalion 3's district.
Industrial complexes.
The waterfront.
Warehouses.
Older neighborhoods.
He had read after-action reports from major incidents involving Squad 1.
Technical rescues.
Building collapses.
Confined space incidents.
Hurricanes.
The message had been made perfectly clear.
Squad 1 wasn't dispatched because something might be bad.
They were dispatched because it already was.
He smiled to himself.
Just the way I like it.
The smile faded as quickly as it came.
The last year drifted through his mind.
Not as memories...
More like weight.
Heavy enough to feel.
Too heavy to unpack.
He'd learned a long time ago that some things stayed in the rearview mirror until you were ready to look at them.
Today wasn't that day.
He reached over and turned down the stereo as Breaking Benjamin's Awaken faded into the background.
A small neighborhood coffee shop sat on the corner ahead.
The parking lot already held two patrol cars and an ambulance.
Some things really were the same everywhere.
YOU ARE READING
Black Flag
ActionInspired by the realism of Emergency!, the emotional depth of Rescue Me, and the ensemble storytelling of modern first responder dramas, Black Flag is an episodic series told one shift at a time. It embraces the authentic culture of emergency servic...
