Eddie

Los Angeles, 02:36 AM. Downtown.

The first explosion rattled the windows of Station 118 like a warning shot.

Eddie was already halfway out of his bunk before the sound fully registered—boots hitting tile, shirt in hand, heart pounding but not panicked. He'd heard that kind of blast before. Not in LA. In Kandahar.

Sirens started to wail outside, distant but converging. Buck’s voice called out behind him, groggy but alert, “What the hell was that?”

“Not gas,” Eddie muttered, tugging on his turnout pants. “Too big. Too clean.”

Dispatch hadn’t called yet. Which meant whatever it was… wasn’t over.

By the time the team rolled out, smoke was already curling into the sky from somewhere near the Civic Center. Red and blue lights danced across glass and concrete. Eddie stood on the edge of the scene, helmet under his arm, as bomb squad cordoned off the wreckage.

Then someone in plain clothes—badge barely visible, face carved from stress and coffee—approached him directly.

“Diaz?” the agent asked.

Eddie straightened. “Yeah?”

She handed him a manila envelope. No explanation. No context.

“Your name came up. Inside the blast radius. Not a coincidence.”

Eddie opened the file.

His own Army photo stared back at him. And beside it?

A surveillance image of someone who looked far too much like a ghost Eddie had buried ten years ago.

Los Angeles, 7:04 PM. A cozy restaurant in Silver Lake.

Eddie had faced down burning buildings, hostile insurgents, and Buck’s cooking—yet somehow, none of that made him feel as twitchy as he did standing outside this restaurant.

He checked his watch. Again. He wasn’t late. He was never late. That wasn’t the problem.

The problem was that he didn’t do this. Blind dates. Small talk. Trying to be charming. Letting someone in.

But Carla had cornered him after shift, full “you-need-to-get-out-more” energy, and before he knew it, she’d set him up with “someone kind, smart, and not a serial killer—I triple-checked.”

So now here he was: jeans just a little nicer than usual, leather jacket shrugged over a crisp button-down, hair actually styled for once. He even trimmed the five o'clock shadow down to a more socially acceptable 3:30.

He finally stepped inside and gave the hostess his name, heart doing an illogical stutter-step.

"Right this way, Mr. Diaz."

The table was tucked in the corner—good sightlines, low noise, easy exit. Muscle memory from the Army or maybe just being a single dad. He slid into the booth and tried not to fidget. The waiter brought water. Eddie stared into it like it held answers.

Then someone approached the table.

The call came in as a small brush fire. Contained. Controlled. Routine.

But by the time Engine 118 crested the hill, the sky was already bruised with smoke, the air thick with heat—and the wind had shifted.

“Damn it,” Bobby muttered, leaning out of the rig’s window. “We’re looking at a red flag scenario now.”

Eddie had his gear on before they stopped moving. Helmet down. Jacket zipped. Breathing shallow through the mask, already tasting ash in the air.

The hillside was steeper than it looked. Dry scrub. One-story homes stacked too close together. Buck was already grabbing the hose while Hen scouted escape routes.

Then the second explosion hit—some kind of propane tank igniting down the slope—and the fire jumped.

“Shit—go, go, go!” Bobby barked through comms. “Get those civilians out now!”

Eddie sprinted toward the nearest house, kicking in the door without hesitation. Smoke curled low across the ceiling, and through it he heard coughing.

"Fire department!" he called out, already moving room to room.

A mother, maybe mid-thirties, was trying to drag two kids out from under a table. One was unconscious. Eddie didn’t hesitate—scooped the boy into his arms, grabbed the girl’s hand with his free one, and herded them toward the exit.

Outside, the sky had gone orange.

Then the wind shifted again.

The fire roared down the hill like a living thing, flames licking higher than power lines now—charring trees in seconds. Eddie handed the boy off to a paramedic and turned back toward the smoke just in time to hear Buck’s panicked voice over the radio:

“Cap, we’ve got Hen and Chim trapped behind the south side! We need to reroute—there’s no clear path!”

Eddie didn’t wait for orders.

He just grabbed an axe, turned toward the flame-choked slope, and said into his mic:

“I’ll go.”