Eli didn’t think. He tackled Leo to the ground, rolled on top of him, and yanked the shelter over both of them. The heat was instant—an oven door slammed shut on hell. The sound was worse: a freight train made of screams and splintering rock.
Time stopped meaning anything. Eli’s lungs burned. His eyelids felt like they were melting shut. But he held Leo down, whispering the whole time. Not prayers. Just names. His wife’s name. His daughter’s. The names of every hotshot he’d ever buried.
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They hiked into the draw. The terrain was brutal—steep switchbacks, loose shale, and junipers that exploded like Roman candles when the heat reached them. The fire had already jumped two containment lines. It was racing toward a small town called Pinedale. Seven hundred souls.
“You nervous, old man?” Leo asked, jogging up beside Eli. Eli didn’t think
They cut for four hours. The fire climbed a ridge a mile away, then dropped into a canyon. The wind shifted—always the wind. Eli felt it first: a hot breath on the back of his neck, like something waking up.
“Shelters!” Eli yelled.
When Eli crawled out, the world was gray and black. No green. No blue sky. Just ash and bone-dry heat. His crew was alive—battered, blistered, coughing up soot, but alive.