The Burning Desire to Save

Chapter 13

August 12, 2023

At the scene of the second-alarm fire in Harukawa, Naoko and Shiori had just emerged from the second house that had caught fire and were taking their masks and helmets off after having completed some overhaul on the second floor. As Naoko pulled her helmet off, she felt sweat pour down her face before she then took off her gloves and wiped her face with her bare hands. "Fuck, it's too hot for this shit."

"No argument there," Shiori agreed.

Rumiko then walked over to them carrying two bottles of water with her. "You guys need water?"

"Yeah," Naoko replied to her. As Rumiko handed both her and Shiori water, she asked her, "Where's your sister?"

"She's in the original fire building," she replied as she pointed to it. "An investigator went in there, and they needed someone to escort him. I heard they called the FDMA and the NPA too." Rumiko was referring to the National Police Agency, which oversaw all prefectural police departments in Japan and acted as their equivalent to the FBI, and Fire and Disaster Management Agency, the national government agency in Japan responsible for overseeing all fire departments and volunteer fire brigades, as well as providing assistance to them for major incidents and investigations.

"That's not good," Shiori sighed. "I'm sure your sister told you why."

"Aren't they called for fatal fires or whenever a firefighter gets seriously injured?"

"Exactly," Naoko replied with a nod. "Although they can get called for any fire if they feel they're necessary. If I had to guess, either one of those two old people we pulled out isn't gonna make it or this fire has more... Human causes."

Rumiko, realizing what she meant, asked with concern, "You mean arson?"

"I won't say it was," Naoko clarified to the younger girl. "But that could be a reason for the FDMA to get called here... Unless they think those two old people we pulled out are gonna die soon." Changing the subject of the conversation, she then asked Rumiko, "Speaking of, you don't have much longer until you'll be able to join us."

Initially confused, Rumiko replied, "Join you? Huh?"

"Rumiko-chan," replied Naoko with an unimpressed face. "Did you forget what's going on this coming week? Really?"

"Oh yeah! My final class and the test! I can't believe I almost forgot about it!"

"I bet you can't wait to finally be over with it."

"Yeah," Rumiko nodded. "Me and Sumire-chan are really looking forward to finally being able to join you guys."

Naoko and Rumiko then looked over and saw Yui and Rentaro talking to each other while smiling and acting rather casual. Shiori asked the two of them, "What's up?"

"Yui-chan and Nojima-senpai have been pretty friendly with each other during downtime," Naoko commented. "I heard from someone that they walked home together from the Tanabata Festival."

"Wait," Rumiko replied, suspecting something was up. "Are you saying-?"

"They have been getting along pretty well recently," Shiori realized. "But you don't think they're actually, like, together-together, right? This soon?"

"You never know," Naoko replied. She then turned to grab her helmet, but found that it was not where she had thought she left it. "Oh, what the Hell? Where's my helmet?!"

Rumiko turned her head to look for it and said, "I don't see any helmets here that aren't either next to someone or on someone's head."

"Well," Shiori commented. "That's not good."