New team

13.Searcher

Her dark brown hair and dark skin were shining it the light of the sun coming through the window. She took off her dark but fashionable sunglasses and they saw how green eyes were suddenly measuring them. Her short hair didn't change through out these years, she looked still like at a time where the photos at Pontypandy Fire House were taken. 

"Why did you asked me to come all the way here?" She sent Hannah an accused look. "They are still kids" she pointed to Liam, Julia and Chris.

"We're firefighters" Chris snapped, challengingly looking at the older woman. 

"You think you can name yourself a one?" She looked at Chris teasingly. 

"Stop it" Julia managed to grab Chris' wrist as he had already jumped up. 

"But she offends us" Chris accussed as he tried to free his hand, but Julia kept tight. 

"Ten years had passed and you are still the same Ellie you were back in Pontypandy" Hannah teased as she high-fived with Ellie. "They want to help you all, give them a try" she added encouragingly. But when older woman wrinkled her nose a little as she measured younger firefighters, Hannah had to convince her other way. "You helped me". 

"But I knew why you wanted to find out. I don't even know them" Ellie objected complainingly.  

"Then just give us a chance to explain and you'll find out" Chris muttered annoyedly under his nose. 

"Then why don't you tell it directly to my face?" Ellie overheard and, with a teasing grin, she crossed her arms over her chest. 

"Because, with all the respect, you seem stubborn and I bet you wouldn't listen to us after all if Hannah wasn't there" Chris snapped annoyedly as Hannah rolled her eyes in even bigger annoyance. 

"Calm down, please. I didn't bring you here to argue, but to talk" she sent both Chris and Ellie an admonished look, while she reminded them why they were here in polite way. 

"Ellie, do you recognize this photo?" Julia turned to Ellie and showed her a photo from Station Officer Jones' office desk on the display of her mobile phone. 

"No, forget about it. I don't want to have anything to do with it" Ellie abruptly turned to Hannah. "You didn't say this" she pointed to Julia's phone with a nod of her head. "is a topic of this conversation". 

"I know you wouldn't agree if I had said it was" Hannah enlightened Ellie. "Besides what hurts you to help them? They want the same thing as you wanted back then. That the whole team was back together" Hannah convinced. 

"But I learned it was a mistake" Ellie almost shouted it at Hannah, but the blond woman didn't let go of the older firefighter's hand.

"Then tell us why" Chris chimmed in. "We're farther from the topic than you were, so we're not so emotionally involved". 

"You should keep quiet" Ellie tried to silence Chris, but he just looked up at her amused. 

"Maybe it was enough of silence for you?" He sent her a meaningful look that made something changed in her green eyes. 

"Maybe" she shrugged her shoulders as he took one more glance at the photo and sighed. "Penny was my closest friend at the firestation, but even I don't know everything".

"We already know some parts too" Chris interrupted. "We know about Station Officer Jones' past as a hero next..."

"Wait? Sam is a station officer now?" Now it was Ellie who interrupted. 

"Yes" Julia nodded her head. 

"Chief Fire Officer Boyce must have really thought hard about it" she mumbled as she tried in vain to stay serious. "Has it made him at least more happy about life?" 

"If you understand by happiness changing moods all of sudden and complaining without clear reason, then yes, it has" Chris answered teasingly. 

"Then nothing really change" Ellie agreed. 

"Except that we're here today, because we want to find out what happen ten years ago" Chris corrected.

"It is a long and exhausting story, believe me" Ellie tried to warn them, but Chris looked at her challengingly. 

"We've already stepped too much into it and there's no reason to turn back. So..." He explained. "Maybe you'll help us a bit?"

"What do you already know?" Ellie asked almost bored. "How do you know about that fire?" She woke up after Chris ended counting out the points of their searching on his fingers. 

"From the raport we've recently come across" Chris explained without revealing more details. 

"You are trouble" Ellie snorted as she leaned on her chair with her hands crossed behind her head. "It all started because of that call. Later Sam and Penny argued and it all started falling apart" she started. "When she left without even a goodbye, I was determined to go looking after her" she sighed at the memory of it. "I spent a lot of alone nights searching through messages to find some hints. And even more lonely days driving through Newtown, trying to find her. Finally after almost a year, Penny reached out to me and agreed to meet with me. Something was different about her" Ellie sighed as she put her chin in her hands. "I hardly understood her and I barely managed to squeeze some informations out of her. She told me that she hadn't wanted to leave, but she had made a choice. Her reasons are as foggy for me today as back then".

"But what were these reasons?" Chris asked the question on one breath as he looked expectantly at Ellie. 

"Penny told me something about sense of duty and that she thought that Sam would be willing to understand her from all of us, but instead he tried stubbornly to find out why she withdrew like that. But Penny as Penny didn't like so much pressure laid donw on her and it ended up with anger. They argued, but they never did before" Ellie ended. "From Penny's side it sounded like the main reason was their sense of duty was bigger than anything else". 

"It seems for me like you know something else" Chris measured Ellie carefully. 

"Penny also told something that she had to help her brother to recover from his injuries in the fire" Ellie replied. 

"So it was her brother in that fire in 2013?" Chris asked to make sure that he heard right and Ellie's nod of head assured him. 

"Any more nosy questions?" she looked at all of them with squeezed eyes.

"Just one I can think of. Maybe, by a chance, you know if it was really something going on between Penny and Sam?" Chris asked curiously.

"No that I know about, but I learned I didn't know them as well as I thought I did" she sighed resignatelly. "They were both our team leaders, but they always managed to deny what all the town was talking about them behind their backs. If there was something going between them, they hid it very well" Ellie said without thinking. "But there was also a problem because their friendship" she made a quote sign in the air to underline that she didn't believe in it herself. "Couldn't withstand through the hardness of decision when one was trying to protect the other". 

The last sentancerang in their heads as they paid and said goodbye, leaving Hannah and Ellie at the table.