Sloane Hart felt overwhelmed with an indescribable emotion as she walked into the new fire station. Station 118 was a completely new place for her, but managed to bring back familiar feelings she felt when she had walked into her old firehouse for the first time. This house was filled with new people who did not know her or her past, who she would have to meet and eventually get along with to do their jobs and save lives.

Her eyes carefully assessed the details of the open space as she continued her stroll between the fire engine and ladder truck, her hand reaching out briefly to swipe against the recently shined red paint. It was smooth and cool under her fingertips, comforting in contrast to the warm air flowing through the open station doors.

This place is your fresh start, she silently reminded herself as she pulled her hand away.

"Hart!"

Sloane looked up in the direction of the voice that had called her name, directing a nervous smile toward her new Captain, Bobby Nash, who stood at the railing on the upper level, waving her up to join him.

She quickly located the stairwell leading up to the mezzanine, where she found a group of firefighters sitting around a table in the center of the floor. Adjacent to the dining area was a fully functioning kitchen, Bobby having returned to the stovetop after calling Sloane upstairs.

Sloane had begun subtly assessing the new crew seated at the table as she approached. But her steps faltered when she spotted a familiar-looking birthmark present on one of their faces. His attention turned towards the dark-haired man seated next to him; the two had been so engrossed in their conversation that they had not even acknowledged her arrival.

Forcing herself to recover before anyone noticed, she focused instead on an approaching figure, who had just stood up from his seat at the table to be the first to introduce himself to the new hire.

The Asian man in front of her had a big, welcoming grin as he thrust his hand in her direction. Sloane took his eager hand with a smile, shaking it firmly before dropping hers back to her side as he initiated verbal introductions.

"I'm Howie, but everyone around here calls me Chimney."

"Don't ask, you have to earn the answer," a dark-skinned woman spoke up as Sloane opened her mouth to question the odd nickname. She looked at the unnamed woman who stood a few steps behind Chimney. "I'm Hen. Let me show you to the locker room so you can put your stuff away, and then we'll set you up with a plate."

"That'd be great, thank you," Sloane expressed her gratitude, nodding in agreement as Hen brushed past her, leading the way back toward the stairwell. Sloane moved to follow behind her but briefly turned back to Chimney. "I'm Sloane, by the way."

Sloane then moved to follow after Hen, maintaining pace behind her as Hen led her to the locker room on the main floor. Hen then showed her the location of her locker, watching as Sloane dumped her bag into the assigned space before they moved out of the room and to a row of open equipment lockers along the sidewall of the firehouse, where they encountered all of the turnout gear.

The smile that had turned up Sloane's lips was involuntary as Hen gestured to one of the lockers with brand-new turnout gear placed neatly on the hooks. On the front edge of the shelf, which held a helmet proudly displaying the '118' logo, was a piece of beige painter's tape. 'Hart' was handwritten neatly on it, a tiny doodle of a cartoon heart next to her name.

"That's just temporary. We're working on getting you an official name plaque like the rest of us," Hen explained as Sloane ran her fingertips over the tape. She turned to Hen with a smile still on her lips, nodding her head in understanding, obviously not bothered by it. "I'll remind Bobby to order some uniform shirts for you too. But, c'mon, let's go eat before we get pulled out to a call."

Sloane followed Hen back upstairs to find that Bobby had already set her up a plate at the table next to Chimney, who pulled out the chair for her as she approached. Sloane thanked him as she sat down, smoothing out her uniform as she looked up, meeting a pair of widening blue eyes from across the table.

She swallowed around the growing lump in her throat as she averted her gaze, instead turning it to the man beside her very surprised one-night stand, who had reached across the table with an extended hand. Sloane's hand crossed the rest of the distance, giving his hand a quick shake.

"I'm Eddie," the dark-haired man introduced himself, glancing to his left and not-so-subtly jabbing his elbow into the ribs of the man beside him. "And this is Buck."

"Nice to meet you both," Sloane could hear the strain in her voice as she forced herself to keep it together, starting to internally panic at the situation literally sitting in front of her. She recognized the same panic flash through Buck's eyes as his gaze briefly darted towards Bobby, who had returned to the table with the final plates of food, setting them in front of Eddie and his empty chair. Sloane took the opportunity to distract herself, looking down at the plate of food and finding a delicious-looking pile of spaghetti in front of her. "This looks amazing, Cap, thank you. Do you guys cook a lot here?"

"Bobby is incredibly gifted in the kitchen. He cooks for us most shifts," Hen responded, spinning some pieces of pasta around on her fork before moving it to her mouth and taking a bite.

"We ordered way too much take-out at my old firehouse, so this is a welcome change," Sloane stated, silencing herself to take a bite, humming her appreciation of the flavourful meal. She and the rest of the crew had only been a few bites in when a loud ringing sounded through the station, a male voice announcing the location of a house fire they were being dispatched to.

Everyone around the table groaned loudly at the interruption but still quickly sprung into action, leaving the plates of food to go cold as they rushed towards the trucks downstairs.

The process of being dispatched was something Sloane was still very familiar with. She grabbed her turnout gear and pulled it on in fluid motions, placing her helmet atop her head as she hurried towards the ladder truck with the rest of her crew, hopping up through the door and taking the centre seat in the back of the fire truck. She stared out the windshield as the driver pulled out of the station, switching on the lights and sirens as they merged onto the road.

When the crew arrived at the address given to them by dispatch, Sloane identified the detached house engulfed in an inferno, the blue plastic siding on one side of the home melting with the intense heat. Windows on the house had been blown out by the pressure the fire created, the bright orange flames licking out into the sky. She noticed that the other side of the home had been less affected by the deadly blaze at that point, the siding still intact and the windows unbroken.

Sloane jumped out of the truck behind Eddie and was immediately hailed by a wailing woman in a fluffy pink house robe. She pointed with a shaking finger towards her burning home, barely discernible as she screamed something at them.

"Ma'am, take a breath, we're here to help," Sloane had to stop herself from shouting at the hysterical woman, understanding that this was likely the worst day of her life. "You're going to need to go and see my colleague here. She'll take you to the ambulance and check you for any injuries."

"No, I'm fine, I don't need any help! It's my baby!" the woman cried out, and Sloane paused, looking towards Bobby, who had stopped directing Buck and Eddie momentarily after hearing the statement. "I need to go get her!"

Bobby was quicker than Sloane in grabbing hold of the mother, preventing her from running back towards the engulfed house and telling her that it was too dangerous. Sloane looked up toward the upper floors of the structure, her eyes scanning the damage that had started to creep toward the other side of the home. She glanced to her left when a powerful force of water started spraying through the broken windows, taming the flames back and smothering them, removing the element of heat to attempt to extinguish the fire. Buck controlled the end of the hose, approaching the house slowly while Eddie assisted with managing the line behind him.

"Where is your baby?" Sloane asked suddenly, looking towards the mother in Bobby's grasp, who pointed at a front-facing window on the second floor, the area still seemingly untouched by the fire. Sloane ran back towards the engine behind her, grabbing an axe from an open compartment before grabbing an oxygen supply and a breathing apparatus. She pulled both of them on, securing the apparatus tight to her face to prevent herself from inhaling any of the smoke inside the home.

She pulled the visor of her helmet down as she approached the front door, which had been opened already, likely from when the homeowner had run out earlier after the fire started.

Sloane glanced around as she entered the home, finding the kitchen to her left and the most probable spot where the fire had started based on the intensity of the blaze, which had only just started to be put out by the spray of water the crew outside had directed into the home. She spotted the bottom of the staircase ahead of her through the smoke, the firefighter immediately springing into action. Using the railing to give her some momentum, Sloane hauled her body and heavy gear up the steps, her visibility getting worse as the thickness of smoke increased with the elevation.

She quieted herself briefly once she reached the top of the stairs, crouching down to give herself more vision and controlling her quickening breath so that the only sound she could hear was the brief hiss of air being pushed through her mask by the regulator.

Suddenly, she heard the sharp cry of an infant from nearby, constant enough for Sloane to follow it to the source, entering through a closed door into a nursery just starting to fill up with the harmful smoke from the fire.

Sloane rushed over to the crib under the window on the other side of the room, looking down to find a baby not older than three months inside, squirming and wailing from the uncomfortable heat that surrounded her.

"Hi, honey. I'm gonna get you outta here, okay?" Sloane cooed through her mask, setting the axe down against the side of the crib before reaching into it to pick up the infant and pulling her safely into her arms, cradling her as she looked outside the window. She spotted Hen now consoling the mother as the paramedic-firefighter tried to direct her towards the ambulance while Chimney and Bobby had joined in the extinguishing of the fire with a second hose connected to a nearby hydrant, focused on the side of the house Sloane was not currently in. "Okay, let's get you back to your momma."

The baby had settled in Sloane's arms, obviously comforted by another human being around. Sloane held on tightly to the infant in one arm, her tiny head cradled in the crook on her elbow, while her other hand grabbed the axe she had set down moments ago. She then proceeded to lower herself down to the floor to prevent the baby from inhaling too much smoke, using her hand holding the axe and her knees to shuffle herself across the room and out of the door, letting out a startled gasp at the sudden appearance of flames to her left, having quickly spread down the hall while she had been recovering the baby.

"Shit!" Sloane exclaimed, throwing herself backwards into the room again, pulling the infant closer to her body as she startled and began to wail again. Sloane quickly reacted, rocking her side to side as she moved to sit on her knees. "Shh, shh, it's okay. We're gonna get outta here."

"Hart, status?"

Bobby's voice crackled through the walkie-talkie on her shoulder. Sloane reached up, pressing down on the button on the side of the device to respond.

"Got the baby. Trying to safely make our way out. The fire spread over to this side quicker than I anticipated," Sloane responded, and Bobby let her know they would attempt to slow down the spread so she could get out. She then heard the whooshing sound of the fire hose spraying through a window in the hallway, and the bright light of the flames crept back from where she sat near the door as they were smothered by the water. She jumped at the opportunity to get out of the room after getting back up on her feet and made her way toward the stairwell, rushing down the creaking steps and toward the door.

She flinched back as the flames from the original kitchen fire lit up again in front of her, now climbing up the curtains around the front door and the carpet in front of her, creating a barrier preventing her from exiting the home. She acted quickly, dropping her axe and pulling open her turnout coat, tucking the infant carefully inside before doing the jacket back up to protect her from the growing flames. Sloane pressed her arm against the outline of the infant through her gear, keeping her in place while she radioed to her team.

"Front door is blocked, I need some suppression!" Sloane called out, aware that she was yelling over the growing roar of the flames. She braced herself against the nearest wall as her crew quickly responded, the blast of water putting out the blaze just long enough to allow her to escape. When the spray of water stopped, she got up again, making her way quickly across the threshold as the fire sparked back up again, flames licking the side of her protective gear briefly as she launched herself the rest of the way out of the burning home, stumbling over her feet as she hit the pavement before regaining her footing and standing upright.

She used her free hand to pull off her helmet, tossing it to the grass beside her before pulling off her breathing apparatus, the device hanging off her shoulder as she looked toward the ambulance, where she heard a commotion from the mother, who had now rushed toward her.

Sloane caught her breath as she walked to meet the mother halfway, pulling open her coat to reveal the baby, crying but alive behind the material.

"Oh, thank God!" the mother sobbed, reaching out to grab her baby, holding her close while pressing kisses to the baby's face, tears of relief streaming down her cheeks. The woman looked up at Sloane as Hen ran over, directing mother and baby back toward the ambulance to assess the infant. The mother reached out with her free hand, which Sloane briefly took, feeling a tight squeeze. "Thank you. Thank you."

Sloane sent the woman a smile and nod in response before turning to join the boys in taking down the fire, relieving Chimney so he could go and help Hen in the ambulance.

The next hour was spent spraying down the house from the outside, the structure too compromised for the crew to make their way inside or even onto the roof to ventilate with how quickly the fire had spread throughout. Once it had been knocked down to smouldering remains, the 118 crew waited to see if the flames would spark back up before packing away their gear.

Sloane made her way over to the mother and her baby, who were sitting on the edge of the ambulance, an oversized oxygen mask being held over the infant's face by Hen, who simultaneously watched the oxygen saturation numbers coming from the oximeter wrapping around the baby's big toe.

"How is she?" Sloane asked Hen as she approached, the paramedic glancing up at the newest member of their team with a soft smile.

"Should only need to go to the hospital for some scans, thanks to you," Hen responded, and Sloane felt her throat constrict slightly with emotion at the news. Sloane smiled brightly at the mother, who had reached over to squeeze her arm, thanking her again profusely. "Alright, let's get you two to the hospital."

Sloane watched as Hen set the mother up on the stretcher in the back of the rig, the woman holding her baby close to her chest as she murmured softly to her and pressed delicate kisses to the top of the baby's head. Sloane couldn't pull her eyes away from the scene until Chimney had closed the back doors, making his way toward the driver's seat.

"Sloane!"

Sloane turned around to find Eddie hanging out of the side of the firetruck, holding onto the top of the open door while waving at her.

"You coming?"

She jogged over, taking Eddie's extended hand and allowing him to help her up into the back of the engine, the two settling into open seats as the engine began to move back toward the firehouse.

"I'm sure that mom is thankful for what you did," Eddie was the first to speak up through his headset as the engine pulled out of the neighbourhood and onto the main street, following behind the ladder truck. "You have kids?"

"No, I honestly think I would make a horrible mother. Too married to the job, you'll see," Sloane replied, her lips turning up briefly when she heard Eddie laugh in response. "What about you?"

"Yeah, a son. Christopher," Eddie answered and immediately reached into the pocket of his jacket to pull out his phone, tapping on the screen a few times before turning it in Sloane's direction. A picture of a little boy on the screen with light curls in red glasses grinned brightly at her. "Would do anything for him."

"I don't doubt it. He's adorable," Sloane responded, her eyes softening as she looked back up at Eddie, who had pulled his phone away and nodded in agreement with her statement. "Any kids, Buck?"

Sloane looked over just in time to see the surprised look that appeared on Buck's face at the question, almost startled that she had even mentioned him after the two had practically acted like the other hadn't existed since meeting back at the firehouse. She bit her lip briefly, holding back a laugh as he relaxed slightly, shaking his head.

"Uh, no. No kids."

"Buck still acts like a kid himself," Eddie joked, earning a chuckle of agreement from Bobby in the front passenger seat, who turned around in a seated position to pat Buck on the shoulder, a subtle indication that they were teasing him. Buck chuckled, ducking his head down as if he were embarrassed. "How are you liking California? Bobby told us you're from the East Coast."

"The lack of snow is a welcome change. But I think the heat will take some time to get used to," Sloane answered with a smile. "Found a nice apartment near the fire station last week, a little more pricey than my last. I'll just be glad to move out of the hotel I've been staying at."

She noticed Buck shift in his seat out of the corner of her eye, and it took everything in her to not give him any attention, hoping that the others wouldn't notice.

Before she could redirect the subject to something far away from the current topic, wanting to avoid the chance of spilling anything related to the fling, the truck slowed to a stop as it arrived back at the station. The crew was quick to hop out and discard their turnout gear into their respective cubbies before returning to the now-cold meal on the table upstairs, having just enough time to finish a warmed-up plate before the next call came in.

⸻

"You wanted to see me?"

Sloane stood awkwardly in the doorway leading into Bobby's office, her hand still poised in a knocking position after having done the motion seconds before on the propped open door. Bobby looked up from the paperwork in front of him, sending her a kind smile and a nod, gesturing to the seats in front of his desk.

She walked into the room, glancing around as she lowered herself into the chair, noting the awards plastered neatly on the walls alongside little knick-knacks on the cupboard behind him. His office was much less clinical than her last Captain's, feeling more welcoming and lived-in. Some, especially those higher up, may think that was a bad trait.

"What you did today for that mother and her child was brave," Bobby started, but Sloane could detect the slight trailing of his voice indicating that he wasn't finished. "But, it was also incredibly dangerous. I know you have a couple of years under your belt, and you're not formally in a probation period, but you're part of my team now, and I need to know that I can trust you to follow orders if it ever comes down to it. Even if that means not being able to save everyone on calls."

"I understand, sir. I know that trust is earned, and I'll do my best to prove that I will be a dedicated member of this team," Sloane responded, feeling the pride at her earlier save deflate slightly at the realization that Bobby was right and that she could've put both herself and the baby at risk for doing and not thinking. "I guess I was trying to prove myself to you all. All while I'm trying to convince myself I can still do this."

"I'm not going to ask about what happened back in Boston. Not only did you have a glowing recommendation from your former Captain, but the Chief cleared you for duty, and you passed all physical and medical tests, so frankly, it's none of my business," Bobby started, watching as Sloane's body tensed momentarily at the mention of her former home. "But, you don't need to worry about impressing me or the rest of the crew. I think you'll fit in just fine."

Sloane's lips twitched up at the statement as she redirected her eyes to Bobby's after they had shifted away in embarrassment earlier. Bobby sent her a smile as he returned his attention to the paperwork in front of him, turning the pages in Sloane's direction. She shifted forward in her seat to view them, furrowing her brow.

"The Chief asked me to fill this form out after your first shift with us. We usually only do this when firefighters come off their probation period. But, due to special circumstances, I think this is just acting as a quick and informal check-in," Bobby explained, and Sloane slowly nodded her head, indicating that she understood what Bobby was saying, but the expression that remained showed that she was still confused by the process. "Don't worry, I only have good things to report back. But, how are you feeling?"

"Pretty good. A little overwhelmed with all the changes but in a good way, if that makes any sense?" Sloane answered, earning a nod from Bobby in confirmation that he understood what she was trying to say. "I think I'm really going to like it here."

♯ AUTHOR'S NOTE !

and here it is, the first chapter of this fic that has genuinely taken over my life! half of me was debating just throwing her into an episode for the first chapter but i really wanted to establish sloane's capabilities as a firefighter early on with a more high-stakes call that i made up and to have more of an opportunity to start to establish relationships between her and the 118. and we will be seeing more of sloane and buck's very awkward relationship in the next chapter, just you wait...

on that note, i am hoping to have more consistent updates soon with being back from vacation, on a regular work schedule, and also having started to prewrite for this fic. i'm thinking that bi-weekly will be more manageable for me than weekly but i'll keep you all posted!! thank you for reading!