A/N: Sorry this took so long! I've always wanted to give a glimpse into Leroy's life while the two were apart and here it is. It's definitely a longer chapter than I expected it to be. Next week, same time, same place :') on with it, I'll be picking up the pace of storytelling because everything I've wanted to establish has been covered. 

Enjoy.

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It had been a week and a half since Leroy Cox had received a text from the person he wished to see the most. Eleven days.

While any ordinary mind of this world would conceive the passing of time in months and years, there exists a state in which time was perpetually cyclical and characterized by presence and absence. The number of days, consecutive, they were present; the number of days, consecutive, they were absent from their lives.

Someone had been absent from his life for eleven days straight.

Hush was the City of London at five in the morning down south, cool and waiting for the crack of dawn and pigeons to wake; markets to open and bakeries to line their displays with piping hot breakfast rolls. Fire Brigade Station Twelve had lights the power of soccer fields in its engine bay and it stood out in a sea of darkness, the cloak of night. It lit the textured surface of the station's red-brick house. The house of fire.

Below the building's name in bold white was a phrase. He figured it was the station's slogan. Motto, of sorts.

No one left behind.

"Ay. You must be the new guy." Someone called out to Leroy from the guardhouse, having spotted his larger-than-life duffel bag and standard fire academy hoodie. The trainee stuffed the papers in his hands into a folder before turning to the approaching man. The latter extended a hand.

"I'm Emil. Been at the guardhouse for three years now," they shook. "Been hearing things about you, man. Chief said you aced the exam, top of the cohort—that true?"

This made him hesitate. "Can't say for sure." His tone had given away some indication of fired nerves and Emil, having welcomed a couple more to station twelve before Leroy, clapped the young man on his back.

"Loosen up, rookie. Big day ahead. Go right on in. Chief will see you once he's ready." The man paused right after, glancing at Leroy's duffel bag and the other carrier he was holding onto. "So... what'd you bring?"

He caught on in a snap. The offering.

"Fried chicken." He watched the man's eyes light up like a Christmas tree with presents underneath.

"Fried chicken?" He peered into one of the carriers Leroy was holding onto. "You serious?" The latter produced a large, air-tight box that contained dozens of craft bags—two wings, two drumlets in each; southern spice, garlic butter. It'd used to be a combination of three flavours. Annie's signature 'three-ways' that had, along the way, become nearly impossible for him to recreate.

"Where'd you get them? They're still hot." Emil was an expert of East Dulwich, having lived in the area for most of his life. He knew fried chicken stalls in the area were not open at such an ungodly hour.

"I made them."

The guard looked up in surprise, unintentionally noticing the mild bitterness that had made the words sound so harsh on the rookie's tongue, but his eyes soon found themselves drawn back down to the heavenly craft bags of goodies. There was just something magical about warm, crisp, crunchy, spicy fried chicken at five in the morning and resist no further he did in savouring a huge chunk of southern fried chicken.

Emil felt the morning chill leave the tips of his fingers in a heartbeat, travelling up to his eyes that reflected a warm summer afternoon. He turned to the new guy.

"You... made this?"

"Yeah."

Having Annie wake up at four in the morning just so she could taste his first batch of fried chicken had paid off. Not that they were sweet or anything out of his comfort zone of taste sensors, but. Just in case. Leroy had noticed, whilst deep-frying his second batch of goodies, how ironic it was that despite being the first job completely unrelated to the culinary world, here he was, yet again, brooding over the taste of homemade chicken.

Still.

Emil could not resist finishing the rest of his drumlet, turning to its chef with a splendid grin as he did. "What's your name, kid?"

"Cox. Leroy Cox."

The guard clapped him on the back, pulling him in for a five with the hand that was clean. "Welcome to station twelve, Cox."

Still, it paid off.

*

This time of the day was known to be the quietest in the firehouse; an hour or so before the swapping of shifts. When the crew was either just about to hit their alarms for the rise and shine or already up for cleaning duty before the next crew takes over.

Leroy had found his way to the station's common room where he could place the box of fried chicken on the countertop for everyone else's convenience. His next step, as per the advice of his seniors at the fire academy, was to check out the coffee maker. The buttons seemed relatively intuitive but he stopped short of brewing the first batch only because he wasn't too sure if it was going to be cold by the time the first crew member came down for a fix. Not yet, then.

He made the decision to prep his turnout gear at the engine bay and check his breathing apparatus in case they were called for an emergency in the next hour or so of his orientation. He also thought of familiarizing himself with the locations of everyone else's turnout gear but he wasn't sure which of them belonged to those on his shift. Not yet, then.

His next decision was to search for the station logbook when he heard his name from across the bay. Turning, he was met with a towering figure the build of brick walls in a middle-aged man. He recognized the badge. It was the station's BC. Highest-ranking officer on duty.

"Looking for this?" The battalion chief tossed the logbook his way and Leroy was amazed he'd caught it by instinct at the speed everything was going. The probie bowed his head nevertheless, keeping his composure.

"Cox, right?" BC nodded, decently impressed. He extended a hand, and his grip on the shake was yet another surprise for Leroy. "Reinhardt. But the boys call me BC."

"Morning sir." He stepped back, signing off on the logbook. "Yeah, that's me."

The man gestured for him to follow. They headed back into the hallway down to the common room, getting started straight away with the standard probationary firefighter's orientation. "Heard all about you from the academy. Nervous?"

"Kinda. Yeah."

He proceeded to lie when asked if this was his first paying job, earning himself a clap on the back. As much as possible, he'd wished to look as inexperienced and amateurish as possible; besides the fact that culinary knowledge and years spent in the kitchen didn't really matter when it came to fighting fires.

The BC did not show any signs of looking down on the young man with supposedly zero work experience. He'd first brought Leroy to a private room on the second floor, where each crew member on duty was assigned one and would swap out with a member of the same role or position on the next shift. There, he could leave his bags and belongings for the next forty-eight hours.

Then it was a couple of rounds down the hallways, pointing out training rooms and equipment storage, notice boards for duty lists, administrative rooms, the captain's quarters, the gym, more administrative rooms, the housework roster and then finally back down to the station's common room.

Along the way, the probie noticed a couple of arriving crew members and the off-going shift making their way downstairs for their morning coffee or to clock out of the station. They'd stopped to greet the BC and seemed rather friendly despite the hierarchy. In general, the team felt a little different from how it was like in the kitchens he'd worked in; the only similarity being the heat of the flames.

"Gotta show you how the coffee machine works," chuckled the chief. "It's an old-ass model, so."

The pair passed the doorway into the common room and all at once, heads turned. A mix of crew members from the current shift and those about to start were gathered around the kitchen counter where the box of fried chicken had been placed.

"Aight suckers," BC addressing the room sounded very much like the captain of a highschool football team calling for everyone's attention. So the cursing was another similarity, Leroy observed, somewhat relieved that his vocabulary had remained somewhat relevant despite the career switch. "This is Cox, our new guy. He's probie for six months. I want you guys to take good care of him. And if I hear anything about bringing him to a club after his first shift, you suckers can forget about the new coffee machine."

"BC," the only female in the room raised a craft bag and tossed it in the chief's direction. "Emil said probie made us fried chicken." The chief caught it single-handedly, peeking into the contents of the bag and taking a whiff before turning to the new guy beside him.

"You made this?" He went for the garlic butter chicken wing. A single bite got him nodding with eyes alit. "Not bad, son. Not bad. Welcome to the family."

The rest of the room each had a piece of chicken in their hands, going through bags of their own and gesturing for Leroy to join them at the table.

"Aight I'll leave you guys to it. Those on duty, don't forget to do your cleaning," BC reminded, leaving the common room after hearing the standard response.

A burst of questions, keen and eager, roped the academy graduate into table conversation. He was having trouble following the bits and pieces of every single one of them, not quite used to people being comfortable with talking over one another and resembling a dinner table of seven or eight kids scrambling for a slice of pizza.

He was the pizza.

"Whereabouts are you based, probie?" "Yeah you're early as heck." "And where'd you learn how to make these? They're bloody good." "Dude you should quit while you can—start a food truck or something." "You'd put KFC and Mother Clucker out of business, mate." "Did you really top your year for the exam?" "Do they finally teach you how to cook in there?"

Leroy wasn't even sure if he should sit or stand. Simply deciding was enough to put his head elsewhere and he barely caught the second question after the first. Granted, he'd spent some time adapting to the way of words here in London and for a good second, he had to register the word 'whereabouts' twice.

That, and the distant familiarity of conversation. It had been long since people talked to him like this. For the first year he'd spent abroad, he'd spent it in the kitchen where there was barely anything to talk about if you didn't step out for a smoke break. Rather, people didn't exactly talk in the kitchen. They shouted.

"I live in an apartment near Russell Square."

"Oh woah, you live across the Thames?" Station twelve was down south, covering East Dulwich where the hustle and bustle was slightly tame and, to a certain extent, filled with less tourists. "Russell Square. You must be loaded."

His dad was. But Leroy didn't quite know how to put that into words without sounding condescending, and so he swallowed.

"Anyway, Keisha Gonzales," the one female crew member extended a hand. "Just Zales is fine." They shook.

The first guy at the table to reach for another portion of fried chicken held out his hand next, pulling the rookie in for a clap on his back. "Kevin Jaeger. Been here for three years. Two before that, when I was just a volunteer running EMSes. Oldest of the bunch." Leroy recalled seeing his name beside the Captain title in the station logbook.

There was another round of introductions over chicken, juice and coffee while crew members filtered in and out for a shift change, till the full team had gathered in the common room ten minutes before cut-off. Even then, there never really was a nine-to-six sort of thing for firefighters.

The sound of any emergency alarm signaled the start of work. Minutes into his shift, Leroy was strapped in on the back of engine twelve headed towards a serious fall casualty. Possible concussion. Jaeger gave the rookie a quick rundown of things to expect and prepare for before they arrived on the scene. Back in the academy, they told them fall casualties were pretty common before sunrise, mostly elderly waking up early but missing a step in the dark. Things could get serious depending on their age and living conditions.

Leroy's first casualty was a seventy-two year old wheelchair-bound woman living alone on the second floor of a rental flat, found at the bottom of the stairs leaning against the bannister by her neighbor. The paramedics had her settled in seconds flat and all Leroy had to do was have the stretcher ready. Minutes later, the ambulance was off and headed towards the nearest hospital.

On their way back, Zales, fire twelve's engineer—the crew member behind the wheel of the station's main engine—suggested a grocery run. Part of the tradition; introducing the probie to everyday routines like stocking up the kitchen, akin to operating the coffee machine. Just the usual.

"You hoping for a fire yet?" She asked out of the blue, turning to the rookie behind the cart that was already half full within seconds of them entering the store. The strategy was to disperse and conquer: one person to each section.

"Kinda," said Leroy, unable to lie. He re-arranged the items in the cart to make space for the box of dollar pastries Zales was picking out.

She laughed. "Just had my first one two days ago. It was sick. No casualties, of course. Hey, you a fan of danishes?"

"I... can't taste sweet things," he told her upfront, following the advice of his seniors back in the academy. Not to be picky. Allergies and whatnot however, were forgiven. "Sorry."

Zales did a short double take, but recovered much quicker than he'd expected her to. "No big deal. My dad's on meds that make him lose his sense of taste too, so. Just savoury stuff then?"

"Yeah." He nodded. "You like the chicken this morning?"

"For sure. Man, it feels different when people bring in stuff like that. We usually get donuts and cookies. Don't get me wrong, those are great too." They were joined by a couple of others who'd made their rounds, taking turns to fill the cart. The conversation however, was cut short by another EMS alarm beeping through their devices.

The coordinates however, directed them to a building right across the street. In an instant, the organized items in the cart turned into a heap of items, parked at a corner on their way out.

"We'll be right back Kayce. You have a good morning," Jaeger called to the store manager making her rounds, jerking his thumb over his shoulder. "Left the cart at the usual place."

Then they were off.

"Stepped on broken glass—" Leroy could hear through the receiver, again, readying the stretcher while other crew members tended to the casualty. Minutes after first aid, the ambulance arrived, picked up the man with the bleeding foot, and sped off.

After finishing up their grocery run, the crew headed back to the firehouse for brunch prep—a rare occasion only because they'd each had a good fill of fried chicken earlier that morning. Leroy helped with the onion dicing out of courtesy but seconds in, the other shift members had gathered around him to watch.

The conversation about last week's fire was soon abandoned and turned, instead, towards an interest in the rookie's private life.

"So... you like cooking huh, probie?"

"Not really. I just... try."

"Oh. So what'dyou do on off days?"

He paused to think. It was a long moment; so long that Jaeger, going at the carrots with a peeler, turned to him with amusement in his eyes. "Dude. Any hobbies? Interests? Basketball? Disney? Girlfriend?"

"..."

"So you're single."

Yet another pause. His hand with the kitchen knife hovered above the next onion he was about to victimize into perfect squares. The chill of a frozen lake crept up to the back of his head but he was used to dealing with the memory. With it being merely a memory, and nothing more.

"Yeah." He rejoined.

Jaeger laughed. "Took you long enough. Which means you have a fuck-ton of free time, yeah?"

"... True." He thought harder. Did he? For some strange, odd reason, Leroy never really felt the luxury of free time; time to himself, unobligated to decisions or the ticking of passing time, tight and ready to snap. For the past two years of his stay in London, he'd been taking care of Annie, bringing her to the many doctors, therapists and group sessions that Siegfried had been paying for in exchange for the promise of him, Leroy, attending therapy sessions himself.

Week after week, he saw no progress. At present, the taste of something sweet was an almost. A memory on the brink of being forgotten.

That aside, he'd been busy with odd jobs for pocket money, studying for his exams at the fire academy and working out. Keeping himself way above the bar in order to pass the compulsory fitness test.

"What about Netflix. Or movies," Zales chipped in. "You watch any of that?"

"I don't have a subscription..."

"Okay, so what do you do before sleeping?" One other crew member re-phrased the question, applying some sort of practical scenario. "YouTube. Or Facebook, right?"

At the very least, it was a question Leroy could answer.

"Jerk off, I guess."

An immediate, instant burst of laughter ensued and all preparation for lunch came to a stop, abandoned, making way for the unexpected revelation of the rookie's blunt, careless nature. Indeed, with his one-word replies and lack of varied facial expressions, he'd appeared quiet and reserved—at most, cold. Stand-offish.

Because he'd sounded so honest and real, no one in the room had the heart to hold it against him for being seemingly crude on his first day. Even Zales had took this in good humor.

"Y'know mate," carrot peeling had become the last of Jaeger's priorities and concerns when he turned to Leroy with a clap on his shoulder. "You really could get yourself a girlfriend easy. Now I'm not joking. People like you are just... magnetic, I guess. Ever heard of dating apps?"

"You have time for that?" Came his genuine response, again, honest and straight-to-the-point. It called for some thoughtful consideration.

"Point taken, probie," Jaegar laughed, hand raised. "Looks like you've got the fire life in your head already. A couple of others hopped on board, agreeing. Leroy had been done with the onions ages ago and had moved on to take over the carrots on Jaeger's end.

"Man, my girlfriend hates it when I'm subbing in on date nights. Even when my pager doesn't go off." "Not like you can help it if it does." "No, I mean, it's the way our eyes light up when we get a call, like, we'd rather be at a fire than the Friends marathon they insisted on. You get?"

"Hey, any recs for Valentine's dinner? Gotta land a table before everyone else starts calling up restaurants. Preferably near a hotel so my girlfriend and I can just," Zales' gesture was vague and yet, perfectly understandable to the room of men. "You know."

"Woah, woah," Jaeger switched gears, a hand over her face. "Not in front of the kid, Zales."

"Oh come on he can't be that young," she rolled her eyes, shoving the captain's arm out of her personal space and turning to Leroy. "I mean, if you are then I guess you're pretty mature for your age. How old are you anyway?"

"Nineteen in August."

She blinked. So did the rest of the team. Jaeger gave her a look. "See?"

"You're not that young. But, uh, gotta admit... was expecting you to be a little older, with the way you talk and... just," she gestured vaguely in his direction. "You just seem like you've been through a lot."

"Yeah but doesn't mean you go around asking him for advice on which hotel has the best bed," the captain pointed out. A crew member was quick to disagree.

"No harm. It's just a hotel." They turned to Leroy. "Know any good ones?"

The rookie had been staring at the carrots on his chopping board, perfectly skinned and julienned. Rationally speaking, he would never recommend the restaurants he'd worked at prior to his time in the academy, let alone a hotel he'd never once had the luxury of staying in for... leisure... purposes. In London, at least.

He was about to provide an honest, boring response when the EMS alarm went off and the crew was, once again, back on the road speeding to the destination. A minute into the call, they dispatchers called for false alarm. Making their way back to the firehouse encountered yet another EMS case.

A part-timer at a fast-food joint had minor burns on her forearm after accidentally coming into contact with heated metal. Upon arriving at the scene at assessing the condition of the casualty, Jaeger got Leroy on primary first-aid instead of the other crew members.

"We all start somewhere, probie. Gotta get your hands dirty."

At the very least, burns and cuts were something that he'd seen and treated for most of his lifetime, spent in the kitchen. Whether it was his own or others, Leroy wasn't unfamiliar with the dangers any kitchen could pose to its staff. He tended to the burns and, after receiving no response from the victim when asked a simple question of 'on the scale of one-to-ten', he realized her face was red.

"So... ten?" He squinted.

She opened her mouth. Then closed it. Then opened it again. "You are very handsome."

Naturally, Leroy, who, by then, had had the social skills equivalent to that of a goldfish, understood very well what the opening and closing mouth thing meant in the realm of the goldfish but could not, for the love of chickens and Nando's, register what the fuck she was referring to. Needless to say, he'd completely disregarded the statement and packed the girl into the ambulance, sending her straight to the hospital.

On the way back to the firehouse, the entire crew was in tears.

"It was a compliment, you idiot." "She's calling you handsome." "Do you even know what that means or do eighteen-year-olds nowadays just use the word hot?" "Or like, cute." "Handsome's not old-fashioned is it?" "Oh my fucking god the look on your face when she said it though." "But good job on the first-aid, probie."

"Y'know what boy," Jaeger said through the comms on fire twelve's engine, glancing over his shoulder at the rookie strapped up in the back. "I wouldn't be surprised if you'd come to me for some quality advice someday. Tip number one: there's actually limit to how long you should be spending in front of the condom shelf taking your pick."

Beside him, Zales yelled something along the lines of 'you can shut up now'. Fortunately for her, another timely call came in just as they rounded the corner of the street down station twelve. An MVA.

Leroy's first. And by the sound of it, the accident was pretty severe. The coordinates directed them to a cross-section right in the middle of Elephant and Castle, slightly beyond the area they were used to covering but because the other stations were out on calls, they were the closest and quickest to arrive on the scene. First up was an assessment by the captain.

Ladder twelve was already pulling out the step chocks and wedges while Zales called for Leroy to ready a hose. Seconds were not allowed in snap decisions required in a situation like such—the victims, quite clearly seen from where they'd stopped the engine, were in a bad shape. He did not ask why a hose was required in the absence of a fire. He simply did as told.

They neared the family car that had its windows shattered and blown. The end of a metal rod that was part of the construction site the vehicle had crashed into drove right into the driver's abdomen. Middle-age woman. Eyes wide open. Face blue.

He knew she was gone the second he laid eyes on her but there were two other casualties—children, assessed by Jaeger—at the back of the car, crushed by the weight of scaffolding that had collapsed onto the bonnet upon impact.

"Stay back!" The captain made orders, arms out right in front of Leroy as he neared with a hydraulic spreader and hose. He stopped dead in his tracks. "There's a leak. It was a rollover, judging by the debris and the direction of the collapse. The rod slid in afterwards, when the windows were already broken so the driver wouldn't have had the time to react. The battery might still be active... the thing could blow up any time."

Immediately, there were orders to set the parameters even wider—pushing onlookers further back and passing vehicles onto two lanes down. In the middle of Elephant and Castle, this was going to create the worst traffic situation. Zales was having the dispatcher ring for backup flaggers.

Sirens. "Winston, get on the other end and see if you can make a cut on the rear door. Rookie you give him a hand. And bring that hose with you! Thompson I need you on battery check—" Sirens.

Everything was wailing and there was shouting over the wailing and the debris and the blood, so much pouring out of a body so small—a child, no more than five years old—the other, her skull crushed, where only half of her head remained intact and the eye, the eye stared him straight down while the relief cut was being made and barely a minute into the task, more shouting.

"GET BACK!" Thompson, in his full PPE just several feet away from Leroy had, in that instant, given the ultimatum. "IT'S ACTIVE!"

That was their cue to leave immediately. The car batteries had to be inactive in order for the rest of the crew to be anywhere near the vehicle without taking their lives in the heat of a thousand degrees all at once and in an instant. The pair making the relief cut were about to bolt away when one of them, the sentimental, candle-like idiot of a firefighter saw a movement under the backseat.

White, with black spots.

"There's a dog in there."

"What?" Winston's eyes, up close, flashed an urgent red.

"Under the backseat. There's a dog."

"You're fucking kidding me."

Both returned despite their captain's orders, and to Thompson's angry surprise. "What are you guys—I told you to LEAVE!"

Jaeger was yelling something else, shouting at them through the voice comms but the pair was too busy making the relief cut, continuing where they left off in the heated speed of urgency, prying the entire B-post off the car and cranking open the door.

That was when he felt the horrible, horrible heat. The inside of the car was practically steaming. Leroy made a dive for the puppy that was weak and bleeding from its tail, taking it in his arms where he could feel the beat of its tiny heart that was alive amidst the hot, steaming air that smelled of death, all while Winston threw the hydraulic spreader aside and grabbed the hose—BANG.

The car erupted in flames behind the pair and the force of it threw both of them to the ground. Jaeger and Zales had the flames doused in foam and the pair were on their feet in seconds, turning around to check on Thompson who'd backed up and made it out at the very last second.

Sirens. Wailing. Screams. The spit and the crackle of flames; the hiss of foam and chemical; the scent of ash and dark, putrid smoke. The beat of life in his arms. He looked down at little thing, a candle struggling against the might of the Wind.

"No one's leaving you behind anymore."