"Help Is Not Coming"
Season 2, Episode 3

"Ryles." Hen shouted, trying to get Rylin to gain consciousness.

Her head was pounding, feeling like she just got hit by a bus. She groaned as she slowly opened her eyes, "What the hell happened?"

"Well. Based on our surroundings, it seems that we fell under a bunch of debris." Hen struggled.

"Are you okay?" Rylin asked.

"Yeah- just trying to get this thing off of me." she said as she struggled to get a bit of rubble off her leg.

Rylin started towards Hen seeing as she had a clear pathway toawrds her, but as she went to move, a sharp pain surged through her ribcage.

After nearly yelling in pain, Hen spoke up. "Don't move, you probably broke a few ribs when you landed."

Rylin groaned in response, carefully leaning back on a pile of debris.

"Bobby!" Hen shouted as she attempted to radio the team. "Buck! Chim!?" she called. "Rylie, my radio's broken. Mind checking yours?"

Rylin slowly held up her radio with a sigh. It was crushed during the fall. "Hate to say it, but mine's broken too."

The two started shouting, trying to see if the team or anyone for that matter, was down there with them.

"Hey! Hello?" Hen called out. Coughing was heard not to far from the duo.

"What is it, Hen?" Rylin shouted, her breathing getting heavy. The next few minutes, she ended up sitting in silence. She was aware Hen found someone and had her attention focused on whoever it was. She didn't bother shouting anymore.

"You okay?" Rylin breathed as she saw Hen coming towards her with a solemn look on her face. Hen explained to Rylin about the 122 firefighter. She was unable to save him.

"Think you can walk? Well- crawl?" she asked, realizing there isn't much standing room under all the debris.

"Yeah, but it's gonna hurt like a bitch." Rylin managed.

"We'll take it easy. We just need to get out of here." Hen said. Rylin nodded in response.

After continuously trying to barge their way through cars and scraps, they had no luck.

"Dammit!" Hen grunted in annoyance. She tossed a crowbar she had found earlier on, then leaning against a car.

"Hey." Rylin said, shuffling over. "We're gonna get out of here, okay?"

Ignoring Rylin, Hen took her phone out of her pocket, opening wait seemed to be the voice memos app. Rylin watched sadly as Hen spoke into her phone, giving a message to her wife, Karen.

As soon as Hen ended the voice memo, Rylin was quick— despite her possibly broken ribs— to hug Hen. There was no words said. Rylin was close to giving up alongside Hen.

Maybe this is what she deserves, she thought. Her mother never wanted her to become a firefighter. It's too dangerous. Her mom said. It's a job for men. You'll never make it as a firewoman. Her mom said.

After all those years of ignoring her mom and her comments and pursuing her dream, she was starting to think her mom was right.

Pulling her out of her own thoughts, Hen started to get up from her spot beside Rylin.

"Where are you going?" she asked.

"We can't give up this easily." Rylin remained seated for a moment. "You helping me with this, or not?"

Ignoring the agonizing pain in her ribs, Rylin and Hen began using as much force as they could to push the debris back, making an opening.

"Is that.. a dog?" Rylin breathed as she heard barking in the distance.

"It appears so." Hen chuckled, picking up the dog and reading the name tag. "Paisley."

"Okay, Paisley. Show us the way."

"Paisley, where'd you go?" Hen shouted. Rylin was becoming weaker as they continued walking. Hen was now holding Rylin by the waist to assure that she stays on her feet.

Turning the corner as they followed Paisley's barking, the duo found a little girl petting the dog.

"Kat?" Hen asked without hesitating. She smiled in relief. "I've been looking for you, baby. Are you hurt?"

"No." Kat shook her head. "But I fell."

"Yeah, so did we." Rylin struggled.

"Here, look." Hen started, pulling out Kat's shoe from her pocket. "Look what I got."

"Come on." Hen said, having Kat follow along with her and Rylin.

Hen, Kat and Rylin had been walking for what seemed to be 2 hours. Rylin's entire body felt like it wanted to give out on her.

She was about to give up. About to just fall to the floor from how much pain she was in. Just then, she heard shouting and lots of noise not far in the distance. At first, she thought she was hallucinating.

"Hen." Rylin said, pointing into the distance. "You hear that?"

Hen drew her attention toward the direction Rylin pointed to, she nodded, telling Rylin she's hearing the noise too.

Rylin sighed in relief as she saw an opening that had  flashlights beaming into the mess of debris they'd been stuck in for hours.

Her team found them.

"Hen? Rylin?" a familiar voice shouted. "Are either of you there?"

Moments later, Hen, Rylie, and Kat made their way through the hole and were met by their team.

"Hey fellas." Hen coughed.

Rylin struggled behind Hen seeing as she made Hen hold Kat the rest of the way out. Her vision became blurry as a pair of hands caught her as she stumbled down the ramp made of debris.

"Woah, easy." she looked up from her feet and saw Buck holding onto her.

"Chim, as soon as we get them out of here, have a look at her." Bobby told Chimney to which he nodded in response.

"Come on, let's get you out of here." Buck said, pulling Rylin's arm around his shoulders, then placing his hand around her waist. Rylin winced at the sudden movement, but was relieved she was finally getting out of that hell hole.

"No broken ribs. Just bruised. You do have a slight concussion though." Chimney said as he took a look at Rylin. "You got lucky."

"Still feels like I got hit by a bus though." She said.

"I would be concerned if you didn't feel that way after falling onto an extremely hard pile of debris." Chimney laughed.

"How are you feeling?" Buck asked as he walked with Eddie towards Rylin a few moments after Chimney went to go check on Hen.

"I've felt worse." she coughed, wincing at the pain.

"Is Chris okay?" Rylin asked Eddie, noticing his focus was only on his phone.

"Yeah. Thank, God." he smiled in relief.

"I'm driving Eddie to see him actually." Buck informed. "Wanna tag along?" he offered.

"Sure." she shrugged. "I do need a ride home... and probably some help getting up the stairs to my apartment."

Buck laughed. "You got it."

"You really need to move to a building that has an elevator." Eddie said.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever."

"Okay, one more step." Buck said as he guided Rylin up the stairs towards the floor her apartment is on.

"329." Rylin said, knowing Buck was about to ask which apartment she lived in.

Moving her hands from around Buck's shoulders, she grabbed her keys out of her pocket, but of course, she had to drop them.

She groaned in annoyance, knowing she wasn't gonna be able to pick them up.

"I got it." Buck smiled, seeming to have been stifling a laugh at Rylin's frustration.

Walking into her apartment, Buck spoke. "Need anything else?" he asked.

"Nah. I think I can push through the pain for the rest of the night." Rylin shrugged. "I'll be fine tomorrow."

"I'll come by after work tomorrow and check in— or maybe Eddie will." he said.

She was sorta annoyed at the fact she had to stay home for a few days, but knew if she tried to go to work tomorrow, Bobby wouldn't let her even put on her uniform. "Thanks, but I don't need someone to check on me."

"You say that now, but I guarantee Eddie or I will recieve a call in the middle of the day from you, saying you dropped something and need help picking it up." Buck laughed.

"Okay, whatever, you can leave now." Rylin tried not to laugh, knowing Buck was right as she pushed him towards the door.

"Goodnight, Rylie." he smiled.

She rolled her eyes at the use of her nickname. "'Night, Buckley."

_____

A/N:
Hihihiii
this chapter isn't as long as i'd hoped it would be buttt oh well 🤷🏻‍♀️
anyway, i hope you guys liked it despite how boring it was
i'll hopefully have the next chapter out soon!!

lova youuu
— hales <3